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Book 



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Gop}TightN^._ 



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COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 



Digitized by the Internet Archive 
in 2011 with funding from 
The Library of Congress 



http://www.archive.org/details/poemsOOburn 



POEMS 



BY 



DANA BURNET 




HARPER &^ BROTHERS PUBLISHERS 
NEW YORK AND LONDON 



T^ 






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<n 






PbEMS 

Copyright, 191 S, by Harper & Brothers 

Printed in the United States of America 

Published September, 1915 




SEP 25 1915 

S)CI,A411702 
1^1 









TO 

MY WI FE 



ACKNOWLEDGMENT 

The poems in this collection, with one or two 
exceptions, are those which have appeared pre- 
viously in various prints. For permission to issue 
them in book form my acknowledgments are due 
the editors and publishers of The Evening Sun 
{New York), The North American Review, Harper's 
Magazine, Life, The Masses, Puck, Harper s 
Weekly and The Cornell University Era. 

D. B. 



CONTENTS 

POEMS OF WAR 

PAGE 

' The Battle of Liege 3 

War 8 

/The Plaint of Pan lo 

The Deserter 12 

"Sleep, Little Soldier, Sleep" 15 

The Glory of War 17 

* The Gunboat 18 

The First Dead 20 

The Survivor 22 

• Storm 23 

The Builder 24 

'The Forge of God 26 

The Fleet Sails 34 

' Christmas in the Trenches 36 

Ammunition 40 

The Dead 42 

In a Village 44 

Albert of Belgium 47 

- The Return 50 

[vii] 



CONTENTS 

POEMS OF PANAMA 



PAGE 



The Sack of Old Panama 55 

The Vision 74 

Panama City 75 

The Hospital 77 

The Old Prison 80 

The Canal 82 

GAYHEART 

Gayhbart 85 

MISCELLANEOUS POEMS 

Song 109 

Harvest ...,.,, no 

Ballad of Dead Girls 112 

Lincoln 116 

The Dancer 118 

The Home Land 121 

Ballad of the Dead King 123 

In a Window 127 

Little White Hearse 128 

Peace 129 

Ballad of the Late John Flint 131 

Hills e . . 135 

The Park 137 

[ viil ] 



CONTENTS 

PAGE 

Roses in the Subway 139 

Ballad of a Cruel Fate 140 

Out of the Fog 142 

Love's Light World 144 

The Jester 146 

Paper Roses 147 

Humoresque 148 

Three Swords 150 

To the City 152 

Song in the Dusk 154 

The Vase 155 

In a Cafe 157 

A Face at Christmas 159 

Pilgrim's Prayer 161 

The Vagrant 162 

House of Years 164 

"Three Men o' Merri" 165 

The Teaching 167 

Impression 168 

The Singing 169 

Christmas Prayer 170 

The Riddle 172 

"I Have So Loved the Day" 175 

The Other Side the Hill 176 

The Adventurer 178 

Autumn 181 

The Prodigal 182 

Hunger 185 

[ix] 



CONTENTS 



PAGE 



The Bride 187 

The Ragged Piper 189 

Sisters of the Cross of Shame 193 

Poem for Easter 196 

In a Death House 197 

In a Garret 203 

* The Dreadnought 205 

"Who Dreams Shall Live" 209 

Wayfarers 210 

My Saint Lies Sleeping 214 

Song for Youth 216 

The Vagabond 217 

Life 219 

POEMS ABOUT TOWN 

The Woolworth Building 223 

JiMSY 225 

The Window Poster 227 

The Outcast 229 

Subway Track-walkers 231 

The Hand-organ Man . , 233 

The Mills Hotel 235 

The Unemployed 237 

The Bread-line 239 

From an "L" Train Window 241 

Out of the Night 243 

Washington Square 244 

[x] 



CONTENTS 
DIALECT POEMS 



PAGE 



The Road to Vagabondia 249 

The Golden Wedding 252 

Havana Bay 255 

Maggie McFay 258 

Laddie 261 

The Ballad of Dennis McGinty 263 

Little Fisherman 265 

Christmas on the Road 266 



[x!] 



DEDICATION 

A little while to pass within the throngy 

To dream, to toil, to weep, to love, to die — 

And then the silence and the closing Song, 
And no more of the riddle that was I! 

My Book shall stand tipon the quiet shelf 

Like some bright banner that the fates have furled; 

My dust, that zvas the symbol of my Self, 
Shall scatter to the distance of the world. 

Yet who in this brief passing finds despair 
Denies the certain God within his breast. 

Life has a crown for every man to wear. 
Though 'tis a thing of moments at the best. 

A thing of moments, scattered preciously 
Across the level causeway of the years! 

And yet what sudden Light may I not see? 
What Vision making glory of my tears? 

Mayhap if I sing bravely, true and well. 
My song shall strike God's universal rhyme. 

And like the echoes of a sweet, stilled bell 
Live in the heart of heaven after Time, 



POEMS OF WAR 



>?". 



THE BATTLE OF LI£GE 

Now spake the Emperor to all his shining battle 

forces. 
To the Lancers and the Rifles, to the Gunners and 

the Horses; 
And his pride surged up within him as he saw their 

banners stream! 
"'Tis a twelve-day march to Paris, by the road 

our fathers traveled 
And the prize is half an empire when the scarlet 

road's unraveled — 
Get you now across the border, 
God's decree and William's order — 
Climb the frowning Belgian ridges 
With your naked swords agleam! 
Seize the City of the Bridges — 
Then get on, get on to Paris — 
To the jeweled streets of Paris — 
To the lovely woman, Paris, that has driven me 

to dream!" 

[3] 



A hundred thousand fighting men 

They climbed the frowning ridges, 

With their flaming swords drawn free 

And their pennants at their knee, 

They went up to their desire, 

To the City of the Bridges, 

With their naked brands outdrawn 

Like the lances of the dawn! 

In a swelling surf of fire, 

Crawling higher — higher — higher — 

Till they crumpled up and died 

Like a sudden wasted tide. 

And the thunder in their faces beat them down 

and flung them wide! 
They had paid a thousand men. 
Yet they formed and came again. 
For they heard the silver bugles sounding challenge 

to their pride, 
And they rode with swords agleam, 
For the glory of a dream, 
And they stormed up to the cannon's mouth and 

withered there and died. . . . 



[4] 



The daylight lay in ashes 
On the blackened western hill, 
And the dead were calm and still; 
But the Night was torn with gashes — 
Sudden ragged crimson gashes — 
And the siege-guns snarled and roared, 
With their flames thrust like a sword, 
And the tranquil moon came riding on the heavens' 
silver ford. 

What a fearful world was there, 

Tangled in the cold moon's hair! 

Man and beast lay hurt and screaming, 

(Men must die when Kings are dreaming!) — 

While within the harried town 

Mothers dragged their children down 

As the awful rain came screaming 

For the glory of a Crown! 

So the Morning flung her cloak 
Through the hanging pall of smoke — 
Trimmed with red it was, and dripping with a 

deep and angry stain! 
And the Day came walking then 

[si 



Through a lane of murdered men, 
And her light fell down before her like a Cross 
upon the plain! 

But the forts still crowned the height 
With a bitter iron crown! 
They had lived to flame and fight, 
They had lived to keep the Town! 
And they poured their havoc down 
All that day . . . and all that night . . . 
While four times their number came, — 
Pawns that played a bloody game! — 
With a silver trumpeting, for the glory of the King, 
To the barriers of the thunder and the fury of 
the flame! 

So they stormed the iron Hill, 

O'er the sleepers lying still. 

And their trumpets sang them forward through 

the dull succeeding dawns. 
But the thunder flung them wide, 
And they crumpled up and died. 
They had waged the war of monarchs — and they 

died the death of pawns. 
[6] 



But the forts still stood. . . . Their breath 

Swept the foeman like a blade, 

Though ten thousand men were paid 

To the hungry purse of Death, 

Though the field was wet with blood, 

Still the bold defenses stood, 

Stood ! 

And the King came out with his body-guard at the 

day's departing gleam — 
And the moon rode up behind the smoke and showed 

the King his dream. 



\7] 



WAR 

All down the reeking trail of years the mailed 
armies go, 

With mock of flags and bitter drums and dead 
hearts in a row, 

Behind them in the gloom of blood the broken 
nations lie — 

And o'er them wheels their gruesome god, a buz- 
zard in the sky. 

For some have marched with heathen curse, and 

some with Christian prayer, 
But all have paid the vulture god that beats the 

darkened air; 
And women know and children know that hear 

the trumpets' breath, 
There is no god goes with them but the wheeling 

god of death. 

A thousand vineyards rot and die, a thousand 
hearths lie cold, 

[8] 



And still earth sends her armies down for some 

Hew shame of gold, 
And still the little mothers sit with faces white 

and wan, 
And watch the buzzards wheeling in the crimson 

smoke of dawn! 

How long, O Liege of Heaven, ere Thy fearful 

judgments cease? 
What sin is on my brother's hand that will not 

give him peace? 
What flaw is in the Potter's clay that molds us 

to such shame, 
And puts upon a murdered man the grinning 

mask of fame? 

Down all the reeking trail of years I see the 

armies go, 
With mock of flags and waste of dreams and dead 

hearts in a row, 
And high above the blighted road their iron feet 

have trod 
I see the awful clouding wing that blots the face 

of God. 

[9l 



THE PLAINT OF PAN 

Mars has my reed! My pipe of water rush, 
Whereon I played the shepherds to their toil, 

And whistled up the reaper in the dawn, 
And whiled the plowman furrowing the 
soil. 

My reed! My precious pipe! The trill in it 
Was lighter than the laugh of water-brooks — 

'Twas life itself, I tell you — oft and oft 

Fve charmed a savant with it from his books. 

And made a wise man of him, too! And then 
When twilight hazed the pretty woodland 
streams, 

Fve led my lovers with a lilt of faith 

Until their eyes were wonderful with dreams. 

Fve piped the winding caravans of peace, 
And set a singing wind to blow the ships — 

fio] 



Now Mars, the braggart, thieves my pipe away, 
And claps it to his rough and blowsy lips. 

Jupiter, listen! Does he know the stops? 

Can he awake those silver twining airs 
By which I bound my world? Hark, as he pipes 

Afar the angry strident trumpet blares! 

My song is twisted out of all its sweet! 

Souls cry in agony! The loosed sword gleams; 
Oh, Jupiter, give Pan his pipes again! 

The world's awry — and there are no more 
dreams! 



[II] 



THE DESERTER 

There was a face at a window 

As we went marching by — 
There was the face of a woman. 

And ril see it till I die! 

The drums beat like a strong man's heart 

As we swung down the hill; 
The flags were snapping in the wind 

And the fifes were blowing shrill . . . 
And then I saw a woman's face 

And I knew I could not kill. 

'Twas gone again in half a flash-=* 

I only saw her eyes 
As I have sometimes seen a star 

Fall blindly down the skies. 
And then ... I heard the beating drums, 

And knew that thej^ were lies, 

[12] 



I could not take another step — 
God help me! — for my Hfe; 

A madness gripped my whirhng brain, 
And stung me like a knife. . . . 

I threw my lance down in the road 
And cursed the blowing fife. 

An officer rode up ... I saw 
His naked sword outdrawn; 

But he only sat his horse and smiled 
With a face most strangely wan, 

"I know," he said, "I saw it, too." 
And then, *' You'll die at dawn!" 

He beckoned. Soldiers took my arms 
And dragged me to the rear. 

I passed a thousand staring eyes, 
I heard my comrades jeer; 

They said that I had been afraid — 
They lied! It was not fear. . . . 

It was a woman's stricken face 
That looked across the sill 

[13] 



As we came down the iron road 
With our fifes a-blowing shrill. 

It was a face that looked at me 
And would not let me kill. 

And so I wait beneath the stars, 
A soul condemned to die — 

And down the curling road I hear 
My comrades marching by. 

And all the fifes and all the drums 
I know to be a lie! 

There was a face at a window 
That looked out and was gone — 

There was the face of a woman. 
And I'll see it till the dawn! 



[14] 



"SLEEP, LITTLE SOLDIER, SLEEP" 

Do you lie alone beneath the moon? 

Sleep, little soldier, sleep. 
A mother's heart is broken soon — 

Sleep, little soldier, sleep. 
They say that you will come no more — 
Yet I place my lamp within the door 
Lest you look back from that other shore — 

Sleep, little soldier, sleep. 

Was there any hand to cool your brow? 

Sleep, little soldier, sleep. 
Where's all the laughter of you now? 

Sleep, little soldier, sleep. 
Another year, with sun and rain. 
The field will bear its golden grain, 
But you will never smile again — 

Sleep, little soldier, sleep. 

Oh, light his dreams, thou mother moon! 
Sleep, little soldier, sleep. 
[IS] 



A woman's heart is broken soon — 
Sleep, little soldier, sleep. 

The King, he wears his royal crown. 

The gay flags wave above the town; 

But the little soldier lays him down- 
Sleep, little soldier, sleep. 



[i6] 



THE GLORY OF WAR 

Hoof-beat and trumpet blast. 

And banners in the dawn! 
And what of the grain in the fallow field 

When the husbandman has gone? 

Sword song and battle roar, 

And the great grim fighting-line! 

And what of the woman in the door 
And the blown grape on the vine? 

Drum-beat and draped flag 
And he beneath his shield — 

And what of the woman weeping low, 
And the dead grain in the field? 



[17I 



THE GUNBOAT 

Out in the good, clean water where it's blue and 

wide and deep, 
The pride of Britain's navy lies with thunders all 

asleep. 
And the men they fling their British songs along 

the open sky, 
But the little modest gunboat, she's a-creepin' in 

to die! 



The First Line's swingin' lazy on the purple outer 
ring. 

The proudest ships that ever kept the honor of a 
King! 

But nosin' down the roadway past the bones of 
other wrecks 

Goes the doughty little gunboat with her man- 
hood on her decks! 

[I8] 



Oh, the First Line's in the offing, with its shotted 

Hghtnings pent. 
The proudest fleet that ever kept the King his 

sacrament! 
But down the death-sown harbor where a ship 

may find her grave. 
The plucky Httle gunboat is a-sinkin' 'neath the 

wave ! ^ 

Then sing your British chanteys to the ends of 

all the seas, 
And fling your British banners to the Seven 

Oceans' breeze — 
But when you tell the gallant tale beneath the 

open sky 
Give honor to the gunboat that was not too small 

to die! 



[19] 



THE FIRST DEAD 

(vera CRUZ — 1914) 

Boy, in your shroud of blue. 
We are so proud of you — 

Slain in your splendid years; 
There in the foreign street, 
Slain, while the years were sweet- 
See, all our eyes have tears! 

Now rolls the muffled drum 
Mourning thy martyrdom, 

Boy in the shroud of blue; 
SmiHng and unafraid. 
Still in thy youth arrayed, 

We are so sad for you! 

Toll, toll the bitter bell, 
Hearts have a grief to tell. 
Dead is the boy in blue! 

[20] 



Dead with his dreams denied, 

Yet that he laughed and died, 

Give him his honor's due! 

Give him the loud salute, 
Give him the homage mute. 

Boy that was brave and true! 
Now, while our eyes have tears 
Give him his deathless years. 

Honor the boy in blue! 



[31] 



THE SURVIVOR 

Have ye heard the thunder down the wind? 

Have ye seen the smoke against the sky? 
Nay, for my love goes from my arms 

To march and die! 

Have ye seen the scarlet battle flags, 
The distant lightnings of the sword? 

Nay, for my house hath lost its king, 
My heart its lord. 

Have ye heard the splendid lifting song 
The wind-blown paean of the strife? 

Nay, for they sing of Death — and I 
Am chained to life! 



[22] 



STORM 

Out of the thunder leaps a crooked sword 

Bright as a serpent's tongue — aye, bright as 
blood, 

And men within the moment cast their cloths 
And stand forth naked in a snarling brood. 

The storm treads on like some great-booted god. 
Roaring and slaying with its bloody fists. 

And men are milled between its awful palms — 
Their vaunted masteries are blown like mists. . . . 

We have not conquered elemental things. 

Not chained the lightnings, nor controlled the 
skies — 

The storm breaks and the world's a beast again, 
Snarling, at bay, with terror in its eyes! 



[23] 



THE BUILDER 

America, thou Builder! 

Thou reacher up to God! 

Thou, whose tall cities grope with thrusting spires 

Into the shining empire of the sky. 

Stand now with thy good weapons in thy hands. 

There's a task here for a Builder. 

Hark the wind 
That moans in from the sea! It hath no more 
The song of proud ships going unafraid 
Nor the sweet hum of cities at their mills; 
The beat of souls is in it . . . and the wings 
Of wasted dreams, and the great gasp of Death, 

See, there's a flame to eastward! Half a woria 
Burns to its naked timbers! Heav'n itself 
Is stained, and all the dynasty of stars 
Which we had built our stone to like a song 
Is blotted by the angry bloodied fires! 

[24] 



They burn! Our brothers* cities! All those towers 
Where History lay cradled and where Truth 
Dwelt in her golden garments like a Queen, 
And Art, her handmaid, brushing from her robe 
The dust of rotted centuries, stood forth 
Clear-eyed, a star-smudged palette in her hand 
And God Himself upon her brush's tip — 
They burn! Those ancient splendid cities burn! 
What Art is left? What Truth? What History? 
The whole's to build again — and we alone 
Are strong to build it! Now, my country, rise 
And take the stone up in thy straining hands. 
To thee of all the nations and the tribes 
That e'er have played the game of Destiny 
Is giv'n the task to shape the world anew! 

Then wake, for dawn is shining on the stone! 
Fling thy tall spires to Heaven like a song! 
Come, lift the world up to the rising sun, 
America, thou Builder! 



[25] 



THE FORGE OF GOD 



We had dug a trench in the broken field, in the 

field just plowed for sowing, 
Behind us stood the taken town with its fired 

towers glowing, 
And high above it on the hill a scarlet flag was 

blowing. 



We had sacked the town at dusk, 

Left it black and cold and still 

On the shoulder of the hill, 
With its beauty all a husk. 
Empty, empty in the dusk — 
And a scar upon the temple that was lifted to His 
name. 

But the Emperor had smiled 

Like a pleased and haughty child, 

[26] 



Clapped his clean white hands and cried, 
At the splendor that had died, 
At his scarlet flag flung skyward like a sudden 
wisp of flame! 

There was naught but red and black 

In that conquered world of ours; 
'Twas a bitter town to sack 

With its cursed priestly scars! 

Though we said the name of Mars 
As we laid it on the rack, 

Still it turned us ghostly faces when we smote it 
with the rod; 

Turned us faces black and red; 

Looked with eyes we knew were dead. 
Till the very earth was horror where our iron feet 
had trod. . . . 

Trampled soils and shaking airs. 

Smoke and screams and futile prayers, 
And the sunset like a bleeding wound upon the 
breast of God! 

We had ringed the town with steel, 
We had compassed it with flame, 

[27] 



And our royal master came 
With his gentlemen at heel 

To the temple where the solid shot had torn their 
grinning holes. 
And below the blackened hill 
Slept the creatures of his will, 
Slept his soldiers in the trenches like a brood of 
weary moles, 
But the whimper of their breath 
Told how deep they dreamed of death 
And the faces of the things they'd killed made 
trouble in their souls. 



There was blood upon their hands, 

And they moaned again, again; 

They were not machines, but men 
Freed from fetters and commands. 
And they whimpered till the Emperor came 
stumbling from his wines — 

Came his gentlemen close after 

With their lips still set for laughter, 
Heard, and sickened at the horror of the Wind 
that swept the Lines. 

[28] 



So stood shaking in the street, 

With their laughter stricken dead, 
With their chaos at their feet. 

And the temple overhead, 
And the monarch struck the pose he loved, the 
pose he hoped was fame. 

But the whisper on the night 

Made his cheek a sickly white. 
And the tower made him little; stripped him 
naked to his name. 



Then a Light leaped suddenly 

From the temple's inner gloom, 

Like God's glory in a tomb 
When the sheeted soul goes free, 
From the gutted temple's dusk, 
From the wither and the husk. 
Glowed a Light of sudden splendor like a fallen 
brand of dawn. 

It was glory, it was wrath, 
It was fury of His name, 

As it beat its crimson path 

To the cross upon the spire 

[29] 



Stabbing starward, higher, higher, 
Till it fluttered down and faltered like a gleam- 
ing sword withdrawn. 

II 

A burning priest stood in the door. 

I swear he burned; his garments burned, 
His face was fire as he turned, 
A thing no man had seen before! 
A miracle ... a burning man! 
And some there were who cried and ran — 
But he came with a crucifix between his smoking fists. 
An iron crucifix, he had; 

A Cross ... an image of the Tree 
On which our Lord of Galilee 
Was tortured by a world gone mad — 
Came he afire from the door 

Strode down and plucked the jeweled brand. 
From the pale monarch's shaking hand, 
Held high the arms of peace and war, 
Held high the Sword; the Cross held high 
Till their great shadows marked the sky 
Flung dancing up by that same Light that played 
about his wrists. 

[30] 



Then in that scarred and sacred spot, 

The great Light leaped full-wrathed again; 
He thrust the glittered sword within, 
And when the blade was glowing hot 
He beat it with the heavy Cross, 
God's iron on hell's steel. . . . The toss 
Of sparks made starry radiance about him as he 
toiled, 
And while we waited, shorn of breath, 
He lifted up the thing he'd made — 
A rough-wrought plowshare. . . . Then he 
swayed 
And fell, and lay there cold in death. 
He was a man, and he had burned. 
He lay there, stilled; his face was turned 
To the first gray of dawn that marked the temple 
all despoiled. 



Ill 

Up from the trench in the broken field, in the 

field of iron reaping. 
There rose a cry of frighted men, and a thousand 

men came leaping, 

[31] 



Came up the hill with staring eyes and spirits 
shocked from sleeping. 

There was moan upon their lips. 

There was terror in their eyes, 

They had seen against the skies 
God . . . with smoking finger-tips. 
Smite the glowing blade of war 
Snatched from their pale Emperor! 
In the furnace of the morning they had seen a 
plowshare wrought! 

They came crying up the hill 

Where the town stood like a husk, 
In the morning's pearly dusk, 

To the temple, charred and still, 

To their posing monarch's feet. 

In the stricken wasted street. 
All their costly iron discipline made nothing by a 

thought. 
And they took him in their hands. 

Took the King in their rough clasp. 

Till he cried out at their grasp, 
Shouting futile wild commands. 
But they laughed ... a thousand men, 

[32] 



Laughed and cried and laughed again, 
Caught the King up in their hands and Hung 
their weapons all away, 
And they beat their breasts and sang, 
Marching downward from the hill. 
Masters, masters of their will! 
And their wild hosannas rang 
From a thousand throats to God 
Lifting, lifting as they trod. 
And above the ruined temple, lo, the sudden 
breaking day! 



[33] 



THE FLEET SAILS 

Down through the smother of the gray mist, 
through the dull-shot silver morning, 
We watched a proud ship streaming with a 

ribbon in her hair. 
And the men's red blood beat faster in their 
veins to see her there, 
And we said, "She flies the flag that lifts for no 
man's scorning!" 

Wind shook the water into music as a great hand 
shakes a zither, 
And suddenly we saw the flag flame through 

the torn mist's lining. 
And tears were in the women's eyes, but the 
men's eyes were shining. 
And we said, *'She sails for honor's sake, so God 
go with her!" 

Out to the sky's gold and the blue sea, and the 
vade arms o' the morning, 

[34] 



We saw our proud ship steam away, with all 

her grim guns sleeping. 
And the women's hearts were breaking slow, 

but the men's hearts were leaping! 
And we said, "She is the thing that lives for no 

man's scorning!" 



[35] 



CHRISTMAS IN THE TRENCHES 
(an incident) 

I 

Still the guns! 

There's a ragged music on the air, 

A priest has climbed the ruined temple's stair. 
Ah, still the guns! 
It's Christmas morning. Had ye all forgot? 

Peace for a little while, ye battle-scarred — 
Or do ye fear to cool those minds grown hot? 

Up the great lovely tower, wracked and marred, 
An old priest toils — 
Men of the scattered soils. 
Men of the British mists, 

Men of France! 

Put by the lance. 
Men of Irish fists, 
Men of heather, 
Kneel together — 

[36] 



Men of Prussia, 

Great dark men of Russia, 

Kneel, kneel! 

Hark how the slow bells peal. 

A thousand leagues the faltered music runs, 

Ah, still the wasting thunder of the guns, 

Still the guns! 

II 

Out of the trenches lifts a half-shamed song, 

''Holy Nightr 
Here, where the sappers burrowed all night long 

To bring the trench up for the morrow^s fight, 

A British lad, with face unwonted white. 
Looks at the sky and sings a carol through, 

"God rest you merry, gentlemen^ 
It was the only Christmas thing he knew. 

And there were tears wrung out of hard-lipped 
men. 
Tears in the strangest places. 
Tears on troopers* faces! 

Ill 

They had forgotten what a life was for. 
They had been long at suffering and war, 

[371 



They had forgot old visions, one by one, 

But now they heard the tolling bell of Rheims, 

Tolling bell of Rheims; 
They saw the bent priest, white-haired in the sun, 
Climb to the hazard of the weakened spire. 
They saw, and in them stirred their hearts' desire 
For Streets and Cities, Shops and Homes and Farms, 

They only wanted space to love and live; 
They felt warm arms about them — women's arms. 

And such caresses as a child might give 
Coming all rosy in the early day 

To kiss his world awake . . . 

The British lad 
Broke ofF his carol with a sob. The play 

Of chiirchly musics, solemn, strange, and sad, 
Fluttered in silver tatters down the wind, 
Flung from the tower where the guns had sinned 
Across the black and wounded fields. . . . The bell 

Sang on — a feeble protest to the skies. 
Until the world stood like a halted hell. 

And men with their dead brothers at their feet 

Drew dirty sleeves across their tired eyes, 
Finding the cracked chimes overwhelming 
sweet. 

[38] 



IV 

Aye, still the guns! 
And heed the Christmas bell, 
Ye who have done Death's work so well. 
Ye worn embattled ones. 
Kneel, kneel! 

Put by the blood-stained steel, 
Men from the far soils and the scattered seas. 
Go down upon your knees. 
While there is one with faith enough to dare 
The wracked cathedral's crumbled broken stair — 
While there lives one with peace upon his eyes. 
While hope's faint song is fluttered to the skies, 
In that brief space between the Christmas suns, 
Still the guns! 



[39] 



AMMUNITION 

How do ye load your guns withal, 
Ye little Lords of waste and war? 

With shotted steel and lightnings chained, 
And the pent thunders' roar? 

Or do ye, as I sometimes think, 
To quell the foeman's onward flood, 

Ram home a charge of human life 
And spit it forth in flesh and blood? 

Oh, is it steel or is it bone. 

Or iron price or human toll? 
Is yonder noise the crash of guns 

Or is it cry of mortal soul? 

How do ye load your guns withal, 
Ye little Lords of brief command? 

What drips upon the cannon's mouth, 
What stains the scarlet of your hand? 

[40] 



Are those the faces of the dead 

That stare from out the battle pall? 

How do ye feed those smoking mouths? 
How do ye load your guns withal? 

Think not, ye Princes of a Day, 
To cloak the thunders with a lie. 

There never was a war of steel, 
There is no battle save men die! 



[41] 



THE DEAD 

The dead they sleep so deep, 

The dead they lie so still, 
I wonder that another man 

May look on them and kill. 

The dead they He so pale. 
The dead they stare so deep, 

I wonder that an Emperor 
May look on them and sleep. 

Their hands are empty cups, 
No dream is in their hearts. 

Their eyes are like deserted rooms 
From which the guest departs. 

Ah, living men are fair. 

Clean-limbed and straight and strong! 
But dead men lie like broken lutes 

Whose dying slays a song. 

[42] 



Oh, will there come a time 
Beneath some shining king 

When we shall arm for living's sake, 
And turn from murdering? 

The dead they lie so pale, 

So empty of all breath — 
I wonder that a living world 

Can make a means of Death. 



[43] 



IN A VILLAGE 

(Belgium) 

They were so happy! Merely that, no more; 
They did not ask for riches or the pomp 
Of palaces. Their eyes had smiles and tears 
For such small dramas as the laggard day 
Fetched o'er their homely door-sills. They lived 

truths, 
Came by the world's ruts to the world's delights. 
Their hearts leaped up to hear a baby laugh — 
They went out in the morning to the fields. 

A church spire lifting slender to the sun 
Made them sufficient symbol for their faith. 
They thrilled at commonplaces; and their hearths 
Were forges of the day's mild happenings, 
Where life was welded, link by glowing link. 
And all so simply that it never galled 
The limbs that bore it. 

[44] 



All they asked of earth 
Was leave to live on it, to reap its fruit, 
To drink its wine, to eat its daily bread, 
To love a woman and to trust a man — 
To worship God unhindered and to sleep 
At last beneath the honest soil they loved. 
That and no more. 

It seems a bitter thing 
That man should so deny the common bond 
Of godhood as to slay his brother man. 
And when life's little is that brother's all. 
The deed becomes a riddle thrice accursed. 

What menace breeds in simple villages? 
These folk had only need of bread and love; 
They dreamed of no far empires, nor of lands 
Beyond their hedgerows. They were all content 
To wear the yoke of peasantry, to toil 
From sun to sun. They were the simplest souls 
That ever dwelt beneath a smiling sky. 
They lived, they loved, they laughed, they wor- 
shiped God, 
They broke their bread and drained their cups of 
wine — 

[45] 



Looked out across the fields at even-tide 

With mute and nameless happiness. . . . Their 

eyes 
Were but the eyes of children unafraid. 

And now their gutted houses gape and stare 
With awful empty doors. Their hearths are dust, 
Their spire of faith is broken like a reed, 
Their women, wives and mothers — torn apart 
From those whose very souls they were — lie slain 
With awful butcheries. A flame leaps out, 
The dust lifts 'neath the tramp of iron feet. 
The village fades behind a crimson cloud. 
Above the marching column vv^rithes the smoke 
Of stricken homes, a banner flung to God — 
And in a trooper's knapsack for a sign 
Of victory ... a baby's withered hand. 



[46] 



ALBERT OF BELGIUM 

In the twilight of the kings 

When the purple sun of pomp 
Sank on bloody wings 

Into a sea of spears 

And Death's mad romp 

Tossed against heaven with a surf of tears, 
When to be royal was to be half cursed, 

A man stood clean against the waning light. 
By fate, by manhood, and by virtue first 

Of all the hearts he led to Honor's fight. 

They said to him: ''Stand not against thy gate 
With futile swords, else we shall trample thee, 
But rather let us through. These things are 
Fate. 
Wouldst thou with straws seek to forbid the 
sear 
*'Aye," said the King, "if duty bade me to! 
There is no honor in me if I stand 

[47] 



Weakly aside and let your black swords through." 

They said: "Count ye the cost in men and 
land." 
He answered: "I am well content to pay, 

If in the payment faith and honor lie. 
Come, if ye must! 'Twill be a bloody day. 

And ye shall see how carelessly we diel" 
And so it came to pass that on that gate 

The black swords beat incessantly until 
It opened, and the brutish hordes rode through. 

Moving the heart of all the world to hate. 
Henceforth they fought a foe they could not kill, 

They fought the prayers of men, they fought 
the rue 
Of women's tears, the dreamers' dreams, the songs 

Of splendid singers. They had only death 
To work their will, and they were weak with 
wrongs. 

Against them moved the protest and the breath 
Of all mankind. Whatever thing they trod 

Became upon that hour a sacred thing. 

The Shrines they broke were eloquent of God, 

The crown they snatched at only proved a King! 

[48] 



He fought them foot by foot, a losing fight, 
Yet ever in defeat found victory, 

Until at last, crowned by that waning light, 
He halted with his back against the sea! 

And there he stands, and will stand through the 
years, 

Till God doth break the Great Seal of the skies, 
A hero who shall live, 'twixt songs and tears, 

As long as men have visions in their eyes. 
Then come, ye bards, and all ye hearts that sing, 

Smite silvery lutes against Oblivion's ban! 
Say how for honor's sake there stood a King, 

Albert of Belgium, soldier, monarch, man! 



[49I 



THE RETURN 

Home across the clover 
When the war was over 
Came the young men slowly with an air of being 

old, 
On a morning blue and gold 
Through the weed-grown meadow-places 
Marched young soldiers with old faces, 
Marched the columns of the Emperor with dull, 

bewildered eyes, 
And the day was like a rose upon the skies; 
But they feared both light and life, 
Feared the aftermath of strife. 
Slow they came — 

Now that it was over — 
Silent and sick and lame, 

Home across the clover. 

A woman knelt in a garden by the road, 
Patting a little mound of earth 

[so] 



With aimless hands. Along the highway flowed 
The gray tide, while the day was at its birth. 
She heard the drums, looked up, half smiled: 
"Why do you march," she said, "and play at 
soldiers? 
There's none to laugh at you — no little child! 
Not one. They've all gone back to sleeping." 
She fell to awful weeping. 
"Why do you play at soldiers?" 
Then dropped down 

To pat the little grave. The line went on and 
on into the town. 

They saw it first in the city's eyes, 

Old men grouped by their fright, ran here and there 
In startled herds, with shrill unmeaning cries. 

And there was white in every woman's hair, 
And when a window yielded them a face 

'Twas like a flower blasted by the sun; 

Children there were none. 
The world seemed robbed of joyousness and grace, 

A young girl with a head of snow 
Sat weaving garlands in the market-place 

With hands unearthly slow, 

[SI] 



As though her toil must be 
The very measure of eternity. 
A boy ran from the ranks, stooped, touched her 
brow; 

"M argot, M argot! Is it thou?" 
She did not glance up at the white-faced lad. 
Deep in the gray line rang a sudden shout: 

^'They're mad! They re mad!" 

^^ Silence,, you dogs, until you re mustered out. 
Forward, to greet the Emperor!" 

The line 
Wavered and moaned and stumbled through the 
town 
Like some dark serpent with a broken spine. 
Before the palace gate, in cloak and crown, 
A shriveled figure sat with shaking hands, 
Forming toy soldiers into various bands. 
A figure in a jeweled diadem, 

Who as the swords leaped with a ringing noise, 
Lifted his wasted eyes and looked at them. 
"Ah!" said the Emperor, and smiled: 
"More toys!" 

[52] • 



POEMS OF PANAMA 



THE SACK OF OLD PANAMA 



They sat in a tavern in wicked Port Royal, 
Grim Morgan and Brodley and one or two others, 

A flagon of rum on the table between them 
And villainy binding them closer than brothers. 

And Morgan dropped hint of Old Panama's riches; 

Said little, but said it with evil suggestion, 
Till Brodley swayed up, with his glass in his fingers. 

And swore that a Don was an aid to digestion! 

But Morgan said, idly, " 'Twould be a long 
journey" — 
Cried Brodley: "What odds, when the end of it's 
yellow ? 
I mind me the pockets of dead men I lightened 
That year of our Lord when we sacked Porto 
Bello!" 

[55] 



Then Morgan stood straight, v/ith his face of dark 
smihng: 
"Fll rake them once more — then I'll stop all 
such capers; 
Come home and be Governor! Aye, but I will, 
though. 
And hang every master that can't show his 
papers. 

"FU have me a house that will front the blue 
water, 
And devil a pirate shall sit at my table; 
But now, and once more, Fve a will to go 
courting. 
To dance with a Don while Fm hearty and 
able." 

He laughed, and drew breath; and they tipped 
up the flagon. 
And fashioned his words in a stormy sea ditty. 
Then swiftly fell silent, with dream - darkened 
faces. 
And thought of their hands at the throat of a 
city. . . . 

[56] 



Said Morgan, "You, Brodley, will take San 
Lorenzo" — 

"I'll take it," he cried, "as a man takes a woman, 
With bullets for billets-doux! Aye, and for kisses 

The lips of my sword on the face of the foeman!" 

"'Od's blood," spat a third, "'twill be glorious 

wooing," 

They lifted their glasses and smote them together. 

"A health," roared a fourth, "to all lovers of cities!" 

Said Morgan the Pirate, "God send us fair 

weather." 

II 

The sea was as blue as the breast of the morning 
When Morgan went down to his last bucaneering; 

His sails were like low-fallen clouds in the distance. 
Blown onward, and fading, and slow disappearing. 

And so he put out — and was part of the distance, 
A blur of slow wings on the blue ring of heaven. 

With two thousand devils adream below hatches, 
And steel, and dry powder, and ships thirty- 
seven. 

[57] 



And all down the decks there was talk of the 

venture — 

How Morgan had wind of unthinkable treasure; 

How Panama's streets were the sweetness of silver, 

Where men in gold gutters threw pearls for 

their pleasure! 

And Brodley went forward and took San Lorenzo, 
With patience and passion, as men take a woman, 

And Morgan came up, with his face of dark smiling, 
And saw the sword's kiss on the heart of the 
foeman. 

Said Brodley: "The dead are asleep in their 
trenches, 
But we must press on, with our Dream and 
our devils" — 
He spat to the southward. "There's war in 
those mountains, 
Red death in the hills, and white plague on the 
levels." 

But Morgan was smiling. , . . "The end of it's 
yellow; 
A fortune for each, and for each his desire!" 

[58] 



Below them his men stood with dark upturned 
faces, 
And naked swords turning the twihght to fire. . . . 

And Brodley laughed, softly: "For each his heart's 
fortune — 

Aye, aye, let's get on to the end of our wooing. 
For life is the sweetest when set to adventure, 

And gold lies ahead — and the interest's accruing." 

The dawn saw them marching — twelve hundred 
brown devils, 
With steel and dry powder and gay crimson 
sashes; 
And so they put on . . . and were dead in the 
jungle 
Of great shaking fevers and little barbs* gashes. . . 

The remnant toiled on at the heels of a vision. 
While death strode behind them, a scant twenty 
paces — 
And many fell down, with a last bitter laughter. 
And buzzards flapped in, and made holes in 
their faces. 

lS9l 



The tenth day was sleeping in tents of red 
splendor 
When Morgan crept up to the walls of the 
city— 
Behind him his madmen came shouting and 
sobbing, 
And mouthing the words of an old pirate ditty. 

Their souls were in tatters! And still they came 
singing, 
Till all the hushed foreland was waked from its 
dreaming, 
And high in their towers the sweet bells of 
vesper 
Were drowned and made dim by the mad, 
measured screaming. 

A gun roared, and deep in the heart of the city 
Wild pulses began. ... A young mother ran 
crying, 
*' The English are on us!" Swords silvered the 
twilight, 
And priests turned their books to the prayers 
for the dying. 

[60] 



Then out from his gates came the desperate 
Spaniard; 
The swords were Hke flame, and the towers were 
ringing! 
But Morgan's men waited; lay down with choked 
muzzles, 
And dealt out their death to the pulse of their 
singing. 

Their volleys belched forth like a chorus of thunder, 
A great whining Song that went on without pity. 

Till night drew her veil . . . then they rose from 
their bellies. 
And spat at the dead — and went into the city. 



Ill 

High noon. In the house of a wealthy dead Senor 
Sat Morgan and Brodley — and none to disturb 
them. 
The world from their window was blood to the 
heavens — 
Sighed Morgan, "I fear me that nothing will 
curb them." 

[6i] 



He stared at the stain in the sky to the westward: 
"They've fired the church of St. Something-or- 
Other. 
Much good may it do them! I called there at 
daybreak 
And borrowed the keys from a little brown 
brother!" 

He grinned, and made free with a fat-bellied bottle. 

(Below, in his cellars, the master lay tumbled, 

A knife in his throat — and beyond the barred 

window 

The voices of drunken men gathered and 

rumbled.) 

A sailor lurched by, and stared in at the casement, 

A screaming dark woman flung up at his shoulder; 

The crowd knitted swiftly behind him. . . . Said 

Brodley: 

"They've found you, by gad! And I think 

they've grown bolder." 

The murmur swelled hoarsely; a stone struck the 
window. 
And Morgan w^as up, with an oath for the clatter. 

[62] 



"The dogs! They want treasure! It's iron Til 
give them — 
Fling open the port there — we'll argue the 



matter." 



A painted blue balcony hung at the window, 
Hung over the street, like a lip thrust for sneering; 

And Morgan stepped out and stood silent above 
them. 
His hand at his belt and his little eyes leering. 

The hot clamor died ... he leaned down in the 
stillness. 
"Well, gentlemen, well? Have you business 
with Morgan?" 
His words caused a murmur, confused and un- 
meaning. 
That passed like the sob in the heart of an 
organ — 

"What then? Are you bashful?" A sudden voice 
lifted: 
"Ask Blackie, the Bo'sun, sir. He'll answer for 
us; 

[63] 



He says to divide it — the gold and the jewels.'* 
"Aye, aye," roared the crowd in a wild drunken 
chorus. 

The Bo'sun stepped forward, a bold man made 
bolder 
By rum and crowd-courage: "We think we've 
been cheated. 
We want our just share o' the loot an' the 
treasure. 
It's my notion, sir, we've been shabbily treated!" 

Then Morgan stooped down, with his right hand 
extended. 
And smiled at the fellow; smiled gently — and 
fired. 
The shot roared and died . . . the brave Bo'sun 
fell kicking, 
And lay on his face as though woefully tired. 

"My answer!" said Morgan. His face darkened 
slowly : 
"Get back now, you dogs, to your drinking and 
pleasure. 

[64] 



We march at the dawn . . . and youVe ten days of 
jungle! 
*Tis those who Hve through it may talk of the 



treasure." 



He turned and went in through the window. 
Said Brodley, 
"You're iron!" But Morgan stood absently 
scowling. 
"Fve counted the loot, and there's not enough in it, 
With our shares deducted, to stop those wolves 
howling." 

He snatched up the bottle: "Good health and fair 
fortune; 
A glass to our safe return. Come, lad, and 
drink it. 
This pirating pays — if you captain the pirates! 
We'll put back to port, and buy life like a 
trinket." 

IV 

'Twas night; and the stars were in silver for sleeping; 
Across the stilled water the dim ships lay molded 
5 [6s] 



In darkness, pricked out by their yellowing port 
lights, 
And on the blurred masts the great sails hung 
half folded. 

The fleet drowsed at anchor. . . . The wind in the 
cross-trees 
Sang light as a woman, and lazily threading 
The forest of spars came at last to the flag- 
ship 
And there met the cheek of the mainsail out- 
spreading! 

Up quietly, then, like a startled bird's pinions, 
Went Morgan's sly wings, till the stars were all 
blotted 
With bellying silver; and so she crept seaward 
With no lights to speak her, and guns double- 
shotted. 

And Morgan leaned down from his place at the 
tafi^rail. 
And smiled at each ship that went by in the 
smother. . . . 

[66 ] 



All down the dim deck his spent devils lay grinning, 
As glad for the sea as a babe for its mother! 

Afar on the headland the camp-fires spattered 
The hem of the dark, and the shore in full 
measure 
Was lifted, and bloodied, and stained against 
heaven, 
Where Morgan's mad armies sat counting their 
treasure. 

But Morgan laughed long . . . for his ship was 
heeled over 
With strong-handed sea winds, and down the 
lee railing 
The sudden white foamed as she trod the long 
furrow, 
And none but the stars knew that Morgan was 
sailing! 

And Brodley came up from the waist, breathing 
deeply: 
"We're out! Smell the sea! Gad, they'll curse 



us to-morrow." 



[67] 



"Nay, lad, I've but lifted ill-luck from their 
shoulders, 
For riches breed woe — and I've saved them 
much sorrow!" 

Their laughter was lost in the loud talking water. 
Behind them the world waned, and all the great 
fires 
Were littled to candle-flame! Only in heaven 
The stars held the lamps of their ancient de- 
sires. . . . 



The Governor sat in his window at evening. 
His window that looked on the star-furrowed 
water; 
A ship had come into the clasp of the harbor, 
Clear-lined from the darkness the bright moon 
had wrought her. 

She strode with white sails, like a ghost in a 
shadow. 
Came up at her chain, and stood nosing the 
bubbles. 

[68] 



Afar at his window Sir Thomas leaned breathless, 
Forgetting the brood of a Governor's troubles. 

*'He*s in — and alone. What a fox! What a devil 

To do what he said he'd do! Now for the profit 

That swells the King's cofFers. Egad! there's a 

fortune 

In wearing a crown — an you know when to dofF 

it!'' 

He clapped his fat hands; and a black lad stood 
bowing. 
"Bring candles — and rum," said the Governor, 
grinning. 
And then he sat down with his boots on the table, 
And dozed until Morgan should come from his 
sinning .... 

He came, with an oath, in his great greasy sea- 
boots, 
A sash at his waist, and a pistol stuck in it, 
His beard to his throat, and his little eyes leering — 
"Your voice," said Sir Thomas, "is sweet as a 
linnet!" 

[69] 



*'My pockets are sweeter,** said Morgan; and, 
winking, 
He drew from his sash a creased bag of black 
leather, 
Unloosed it and spilled on the bare wooden table 
Red jewels that kindled like swords struck to- 
gether! 

*' There's blood and men's souls — and the price of 
a kingdom; 
Take half, and let's drink. God! Fm dry to 
the marrow — " 
He caught up the flagon of rum . . . but Sir 
Thomas 
Sat fondling the gems, and his eyes had grown 
narrow. 

** They're perfect! They're wonderful!" *'Aye,** 
said the Pirate, 
"I bought them with dead men — but that's a 
long story. 
Come, count the Crown's share, and we'll drink 
to the bargain. 
These trinkets are turning unpleasantly gory.** 

[70] 



The jewels lay warm in the dusk of the candles. 
Like soulless red eyes that no tears might set 
blinking . . . 
And Thomas Sir Modyford crooked his hot 
fingers, 
And chose the King's profit, whilst Morgan sat 
drinking. 

*' Sweet baubles! Sweet pretties! They've blinded 
my candles. 
They're flame, Pirate, flame! See my hand, 
how they've burned it." 
He laughed, and drew forth from his pocket a 
parchment — 
*Tt's yours, by our bargain; and damme, you've 
earned it." 

They spread out the parchment between them. 
Said Morgan: 
"God's name! I'm respectable!" "Aye," said 
Sir Thomas, 
"You're Leftenant-Governor, lately appointed 
By will of the Crown — in accord with our 



promise!' 



I 71] 



VI 

Day broke . . . and the throat of the harbor was 
clouded 
With sail. 'Twas the fleet of the pirates re- 
turning — 
But down their grim ports no black muzzles 
peered frowning, 
Nor naked steel leaped for the dawn to set burning. 

They came as calm merchantmen, shriven with 
morning 
(For in the King's harbors the law is hard- 
fisted!) 
And so they stole in, like whipped hounds to a 
kennel, 
Their loosed anchors lolling like tongues when 
they listed. 

The candles were dead in the Governor's chamber; 

And in at the window the young light came 
creeping — 
Asprawl at the table sat Morgan the Pirate, 

And under his boot-heels Sir Thomas lay sleeping. 

[72] 



The anchors splashed down in the ruffled blue 
water, 
The great wings were furled with a rattle of 
gearing; 
But Morgan sat clutching a folded gray parchment, 
A glass at his lips, and his little eyes leering. 



[73] 



THE VISION 

"What did you see in Panama, 
Voyager with the eye of dream?" 

"/ saw the squat dredge breathing in the dazvn, 
And the great white breaths of steam — 

"7 sazu the dim amazeinent of the hills. 
And the red suns burning; 

And the long, long trains of laborers at dusk 
returning. 

"/ saw fair ships beyond Balboa's gates 

That zvaited for the morrow. 

And I saw a man go by me with a face of sorrozv." 

"What did you see in Panama, 

Broken hills and a breath of steam?" 

" That, and the long, lo7ig trains of laborers. 
And a mans face touched with dream!" 

[74] 



PANAMA CITY 

Blue balconies, dust and old silence. 

The patter of naked brown feet; 
And the sea caught in sudden cool glimpses 

At the ends of the shimmering street. 

A maze of thin highways that wander, 
And turn with a thousand desires, 

Till they come to the Square in the twilight. 
And the little lit fires — 

Till they come to the Square and the laughter, 
And the little gold lamps in the trees — 

And the drift of the strange burning faces 
Cast in from the seas; 

And the throb of the lovely slow waltzes, 
And the narrow gay sidewalks aswirl, 

(For the heart of a city is music. 
Like the heart of a girl) — 

[75] 



And there, at the edge of the twilight, 
They turn from their gipsy unrest, 

And sleep in the wind of the waltzes, 
With the feet on their breast. 

Blue balconies, dust and old silence, 
And naked strange faces that stream — 

And somewhere a ghost in the shadow. 
And the sense of a long-vanished dream. 



[76] 



THE HOSPITAL 



On the green hill, above the breathless town, 
They built a House of Hope and Death, and 
there. 
Tracing the white road through the flame-fringed 
dusk. 
They dragged their broken bodies for repair. 

All down the Work the word went whispering: 
*' Upon the high hill stands the House of 
Hope r 

And the white hands were many in the dusk, 
And the slow feet fell throbbing on the slope! 

They were the Builders, broken at their task; 

The wounded and the dying, and they came, 
Each with his separate cross upon his soul — 

But none cried, ^' Holjy holy!'* at their name. 

[77] 



None saw the thorns upon their sweating brows, 
Nor heard their spent souls crying through the 
dawns; 

To you and me, Fat Citizen, it was 
Only a needed sacrifice of pawns! 



II 

I saw them at the windows of their House, 
Hopeful and Hopeless, all the wistful-eyed. 

Watching the far, faint sails along the sky, 
Their eyes upon the distance till they died. 

Below them was the endless shining sea, 

And the great moons rode up behind the hill; 

But they sat at their windows, wistful-eyed, 
And on their knees their knotted hands lay 
still. 

They could not laugh at twilight and go free, 

Nor lie with pleasure, nor go up to fame. 
They were but Workmen, wounded unto death. 
Poor pawns that died to speed the Master's 
game. 

[78] 



At evening wound the noisy work-trains home, 
And labor ceased, and love ran through the 
town; 
But they were only Faces in the dusk, 

They could not don their laughter and go 
down. 



[79] 



THE OLD PRISON 

Now where the blue Pacific spends 

Its wealth of sapphire at the gray sea-wall 

They made a prison; and along its foot 
Watched the slow sea-tides crawl; 

But stabbing deeper than the tides, 

Down through the solid masonry they made 

A dreadful thing; a cell both deep and dark, 
Where the blue water played. 

And there they placed their evilest, 

At ebb-hour, when the purring tides were low- 

(Almost I heard the fearful cries he made 
Who knew that he must go! 

Almost I saw his stricken face, 

And that curled, cruel smiling of the guard; 
Almost I heard the moaning of his friends 

Who walked the grass-grown yard.) 

[80] 



They took him out when all the sky 

Was flushed with morning, and the sea was down. 

Into his ears was borne the matin chime 
Of church-bells from the town — 

But he was dark with agony, 

And from his foot there dragged an iron ball; 
A dozen steps across the sweet green grass, 

Then shrieking to the wall. 

And there they seized him in their hands, 

And cast him like a dead thing to the dark — 

About the yard his friends stood rigidly, 
With faces still and stark. 

His dull cries died behind the stone. 

Then, smiling their curled smiles, his keepers took 

Fresh mortar and sealed out the last small light. 
As men might close a book. 

Anon the tides rose at the wall. 

Rose softly, gently, seeping through the stone. . . . 
To-day as I was walking in that place, 

I found a crumbled bone. 
6 [8l] 



THE CANAL 

The linked worlds stand in wonder at their bond, 
The nations quicken and the two seas stir — 

The waiting spars make mist along the East. 
It is the triumph of a Laborer! 

The wonder is the wonder of a soul, 

A heart that dreamed in terms of continents, 

A hand that wrought with mountains and with 
seas, 
A warrior with no murder in his tents. 

Oh, there are poems in the clang of steel! 

And mayhap there are songs to sing of steam. 
Let others cry the glory of the deed, 

I only see the Dreamer and the Dream. 



[82] 



GAYHEART 



GAYHEART 



A STORY OF DEFEAT 



Gayheart came in June, I saw his heels 

Go through the door, and broken heels they were. 

His eyes were big, and blue, and young. He said, 
"Could you direct me to the Basement, Sir?" 

I knew the Basement; I had grubbed there once 
Before a client tumbled in my net 

And brought me riches. It was coffin-cold 
And on its bare walls seeped a moldy sweat. 

'Twas next the kitchen, too, and had the breath 

Of cheap things cooking — but I led him down. 
The stairs dropped naked through the clammy 
dark — 
He paused, and gasped, as men do when they 
drown. 

[8s] 



"Is it down there?" I turned and took his arm 
(Thin as a boy's it was; all skin and bone); 

I said: "The dark is just a pleasant cloak 
To veil you off, and keep your thoughts alone. 

"A Boarding-house is all-inquisitive; 

You're safer here." "How did you know," he 
said, 
"That I would want to be alone? Am I 

An open book to be so simply read?" 

We stumbled down until I felt the door 

Beneath my fingers. Then I struck a light — 

The room grinned at us like an ugly face 

Caught in a heart-beat from the cloak of night. 

The boy's breath cracked his lips. I saw his soul 
Stand in his eyes, and look, and shrink again. 

Sick with the moment's shattered visionings. 
And on his face went the slow feet of pain. 

"It strikes you bleak, eh? Come, it's not so bad. 

The gas won't whimper if you turn it low. 
The bed is lame, but friendly. Here's a desk 

To scribble at." He said: "I write, you know. 

[86] 



"I've come to be a writer." And he smiled, 
As boys do when they say their heart's desire; 

*'Vm from the South — a paper took me on, 
But that's just keeping fagots in my fire." 

He smiled again, for he had all his youth 
To smile from. **My real work," he said, "will be 

To sketch the city — not in prosy books, 
But in its native, living poetry. 

"Cities were made for measures and for rhyme, 
They have an ancient minstrelsy of feet, 

And rivers sweep their shipping like a song. 
And there is endless music in a street. 

"Endless, I say, and never caught by man. 

Your books? Ah, how they walk, walk, walk, 
with words; 
But verse runs on light feet, as Cities do — 

God, I've dreamed it till it hurts like swords 

"Not to be writing; but I've got to learn, 
Learn, learn it all — the streets, the parks, the 
ships, 

[87] 



The subway and the skyscrapers!" He stopped 
And brushed his hand across his trembhng lips. 

"Excuse me, sir. You were the first kind soul 
Fd spoken to — the rest are like the tomb." 

He smiled and touched my hand; and then I 
turned. 
Leaving him standing in his wistful room. 



II 



June passed, and weather came that seared our 
flesh. 
The soft streets crawled; old men dropped down 
and died; 
Within the House our summer tempers snarled. 
And every night the lady boarder cried. 

Her alcove shouldered mine — and so I knew. 
She came at six, her feet as slow as lead 
Dragged through her door, and cried till supper- 
time. 
I never saw her but her eyes were red, 

[88] 



Poor Gayheart whitened slowly, till his face 
Was like the paper that he scribbled on. 

But he had youth, and some vague bravery 
That held him taut until his task was done. 

He rasped our nerves, though, with his restless 
ways, 

His restless, silent ways. . . . He never seemed 
To see us when we passed him in the hall — 

His eyes were distant with the thing he dreamed. 

He bolted dinner like a dog, as though 

He feared his fate would snatch him unaware 

With all his dreams unproved — then, starting up, 
Would grope the shadowed hallway to the stair. 

And down to his eternal folderol, 

His spitting gaslight and his scratching pen. 
Until we cursed him for his industry. 

His being different from the ruck of men. 

Then one dead night when all the stars did sweat 
He plucked my sleeve, and smiled, and drew me 
down 

[89] 



His damned black stairs. Then, while the clogged 
jet whined, 
He read me what he'd written of the Town. 

It struck me wonderful. It had the ache 
Of rush-hour traffic in it, and the swing 

Of wheels, as though he'd listened in a street, 
A crowded street where life ran thundering. . . . 

It made me think of going to my work; 

Of men in crowds, and women's faces drawn 
With painted lines, and shops and ships and 
spires 

And skyscrapers that reached up for the dawn. 

And then beneath the step of rhyme I heard 
The boy's soul speaking. . . . And I knew that 
he 

Had spent himself like dust among the crowd 
To catch the heart-beat for his poetry. 

His voice went out like flame. I found myself 
Shocked by the still, small room. To me it 
seemed 

[90] 



Great throngs had passed with various noise. He 
said: 
"That's just the gateway to the thing I've 
dreamed!" 

in 

There is a street's end, where the coasters sleep, 
And there, at twilight, purple waters run. 

And o'er their breast the crimson-coated day 
Trails the last silver of the fallen sun. 

A wall is there, for men to dream upon; 

And so young Gayheart went, with all his scars 
Unhealed . . . and saw the lights sown through 
the dusk, 

And his tall city in a cloak of stars. 

Tier upon tier the golden windows burned, 
As though man sought new freedom in the skies; 

And somehow, lured by starlight and by dawn. 
Built his blind cities up to paradise! 

Afar the bridges spun their silver webs. 

The mellow whistles talked along the stream; 

[91] 



But Gayheart leaned athirst upon a stone. 
Hurt with the shining beauty of his dream. 

And he was hke a child with wistfulness, 

Holding his hands out through the summer night, 

Where in the dusk the great, clean towers flared, 
Like swords thrust up in some red battle-light! 

And then he turned, all dumb with his desire. 
And stumbled through still streets, until he 
found 

The great bridge trembling underfoot and heard 
The trains go by him with a tempest sound. 

Black, shapeless forms came shrieking with bright 
eyes; 

The sea-wind rolled like drums against his ears. 
And he was singing, singing as he trod. 

And in his eyes were sudden, smarting tears. 

The tallest spire enraptured him! He strode 
Under the roofed bridge, where the newsboys cry, 

And out into that little breathing-space 

From whence the windows go into the sky. 

[92] 



And there he sought a bench and sat him down, 
Between two snoring vagabonds, who lay 

Sprawled on their faces, . . . but his wakefulness 
Was like a lamp within him till the day. 



What did it mean? the stone flung like a song? 

The desk-light brothering the star? The whole 
Up-sweep of roofs that is our native land — 

What meaning had it, and what secret soul? 

He sat with upturned eyes, as young men do, 
Until the lamp upon his face grew wan; 

He saw his nation toiling in its House, 

Its tall, strange House that reached up for the 
dawn! 

And dreaming, saw the Elder Worlds asleep 
In their low houses, beautiful with Time. . . . 

The vagrant at his left side groaned and breathed. 
Lifting a face of cumulative grime — 

"What's in yer gizzard, lad, that twists ye so? 
I know! You're one of them wot's got a brain! 

[93] 



Now me — " His brother raised a blowzy head: 
"Aw, hell!" he snarled, and fell asleep again. 

Across the roofs the first, faint gold of dawn 
Streaked the dun heavens, and the Day Men 
took 

The windows of the sleepless, so that life 
Went smoothly like a never-written book. 

And Gayheart shook the cramps from his dull 
limbs. 

Rose and went up the paper's curling stair 
Until he reached the City Room. The Staff, 

Half stripped of cloth, already sweated there. 

But he dropped at his crazy, limping desk. 
In the dim corner where the cubs are kept, 

And wrote: '^America is wakefulness!'^ 

And fell face down upon the words, and slept. 

IV 

Gayheart's book came back, and back again. 
And still he mailed it out, with little lies 

[94] 



To cloak its failure — but I think we saw 
The naked, frightened soul behind his eyes. 

The lady boarder knew. I heard her say 

A cruel thing. "Your book is home/' she 
said, 

"For Sunday dinner." But he passed her by 
Without the slightest turning of his head. 

She hated him. . . . And so mid-autumn fell, 
With no abating coolness. Each new sun 

Was like a murderer let out of locks. 
And life went sickly, praying to be done. 

A night fell when all sleep was vain. ... I rose 
And stumbled to the windowful of stars. 

That was my share of heaven. . . . There I 
stood 
Letting the soft night seep into my scars. 

The window opened on a little court, 
And suddenly a feeble thrust of flame 

Stabbed like a pettish dagger through the dark. 
Out of the night a ragged breathing came. 

[95] 



» . . 1 saw the Basement boarder stooping dowrij 
His lean face bloodied with the touch of light. 

A tongue of fire licked his hands . . . and died, 
Brief as the flutter of a star in flight. 

Somehow I sensed a tragedy. . . . The gloom 
Was like a grave, the light leaped up no more. 

I turned and groped down through the breathless 
house; 
Until I saw him crouching by his door. 

He stood there, staring at his empty hands 
As though they'd done his dearest dream to 
death; 
The palms were soiled and smeared with paper 
ash; 
There was a reek of whisky on his breath. 

"What's this?" I said. He raised his head and 
smiled 
With a deep drunkenness that touched his 
soul. 
"I'll tell you what it is! I've been a fool — 
The sort of fool that makes a dream his goal. 

[96] 



"I've worked my heart out; done a decent thing — 
And no one wants it! No one wants to look 

Beneath the surface of this world of ours. 

It's all damned artifice. . . . I've burned my 
book." 

Even to me the thing seemed tragical — 
As though he'd set a torch to half himself. 

"What!" I cried, "burned your splendid poetry? 
Laid yourself out like that upon a shelf? 

"What will you do?" "I'll do as other men; 

Harness my talent as a modern should. 
I'll do the obvious with all my age — 

The cheap, the counterfeit, the understood! 

"I've a new job this night; a fine, new job — " 
He spat into the shadows of the place — 

"Verse-making on a magazine! The sort 
That wears a painted simper on its face. 

"I'm rich . . . and drunk. I had to drink or 
scream, 
And drink goes deep with me; ... get me to bed. 
7 [97] 



Fve slaughter on my soul — and verse to make. 
My editor wants — something light — he said — 

"Something that's brisk and — funny." There he 
stood, 

With those raw, suffering eyes and stared at me, 
Until I near cried out. He was so white! 

And older . . . older than a man should be. 

I swear whole ages crumbled in his face, 

For he had dreamed, and dreams are ancient 
things, 

Bearing a harsher reckoning than Time 
When once despair has crumpled up their wings. 

I got him stripped and into bed at last. 

The poor, spent lad! He lay there still and stark. 

His smudged hands clenched across his shallow chest. 
And moaned once as I crept out through the 
dark. 



Success came to him swiftly; made him drunk. 
He gulped life as a drunkard gulps his bowl, 

[98] 



Forgetting all his splendid futile dreams — • 
He was an altered person to his soul. 

He fattened and grew flushed; he learned to sneer; 

His verses ran like swift, malignant flame, 
Smirching the thing they touched and burning on 

To wipe the pathway for his striding fame. 

He left the Basement then; soared up two flights 
With braggart wings, bought furniture and 
prints, 

Nonsense, we called it! — and to crown the show 
Decked out his trappings in a flowered chintz. 

But that phase passed. His true selPs tide flowed 
back, 

We saw him drowning in his own strange deeps; 
A crawling restlessness crept from his eyes, 

The sort of serpent thing that never sleeps. 

A month or two he clung to his gay nest, 
Beat his wings breathlessly within a shell. 

Made himself live with all his flaunted things, 
Grim as a tortured convict in a cell. 

[99] 



And then his selPs self conquered. . . . One May 
night 

When earth was breathing fragrance to its core, 
And open windows drank the breath of Spring, 

He came and stood within my open door. 

"Please," he said, "would you mind?*' . . . And 
there he stopped. 
Sucking his cheeks in like a timid boy. 
"I've gone back to the Basement. . . . I've gone 
back! 
The other room made life seem just a toy. 

"And that's not right. . . . There's something 
more to life 

Than turning it to playthings. . . . I've gone back, 
To find my book again, to do the work 

I'd planned to do according to my knack." 

"Your book," I said, "your book? You burned 
it, boy!" 
He flinched. "I know. I feel its ashes still 
Here on my hands. That's what I want of you — 
I know that you can help me if you will." 

[ 100 ] 



His tone was light, and yet I heard him breathe 
As men do in the ache and grip of strife. 

I rose and went with him. Again he said, 
"There's something more than toys to make of 
life." 

The Basement, with its yellow tooth of light. 
Grinned at us like a long-familiar face. 

Whose daily wont of ugliness, revealed, 

Mounts to a sin within the moment's space. 

Its gaping door still breathed the winter's chill, 
Its single window level with the street 

Flickered with fragments of the passing world. 
Hummed with a whispered drudgery of feet. 

And yet to him its very barrenness 

Was like a savage penance. Standing there 

He bruised himself upon its ugliness 

Until the sw^eat stood out beneath his hair. 

"I asked you down," he said, "to help me think. 
To help remember." Once again the sweat 

Stood out on him, and as I looked I knew 
It was his soul had made his body wet. 

f lOI ] 



He gripped me with the hunger of his eyes, 

Hard as a knife his glance was, hard as steel. 

"How did it go? — My book? Fve thought and 
thought 
Until my brain is like a going wheel." 

I stared at him in sudden choking pain. 

"Boy!" I said. "For my life—" He cried, 
"You must! 
It's all behind a door inside your mind; 

It's there, if you will brush aside the dust! 

"My own mind's locked against me. Now and then 
A line comes back, a bare crumb at the most. 

My plan, my meaning — all the soul within 
Peers with the faded features of a ghost." 

"It was the Town," I said, "in all its guise. 

The Town! It was the crowds along the street; 
Faces and spires and stately ships and dreams, 

Desires, and winnings, and I think — defeat." 

"Defeat," he gasped, "defeat!" And then he 
dropped 

I I02 ] 



Down at his palsied desk and bowed his head 
Upon his arms. ... I felt my flesh grow cold 
As though that gesture meant a man struck 
dead. 

'*0h," he said, from the prison of his arms, 
"What god would wreck a man with one mistake .? 

Give him two selves and to each self a sword 
So he's half slain or ever he's awake!" 

He raised his haggard face. "In every man 
There is division of the dust and dream, 

And Youth is just the crossing of the swords 
Before he takes his place within the scheme. 

"The Town's a citadel for all things flesh, 
And yet a man might storm it with a song. 

Played he not traitor to himself. ... I quit. 
And oh, it was the quitting that was wrong! 

"I was so lonely for a thing to love, 
A single look, a passing word of praise — 

I was as near to triumph as a smile. 

And now defeat, defeat for all my days! 

[103] 



** Cities are cruel things," he whispered then, 
*' Their slaves are Failure, and their gods Defeat." 

In at the window came a thrust of wind, 
Bearing the weary music of the street. . . . 

He leaped up with an oath, snapped ofF the light. 
An instant, unforgetable, there gleamed 

His white face. . . . Then a whisper through the 
dark, 
"I would to God that I had never dreamed." 



The years go slowly in a boarding-house. 
Sharpened with neither passions nor despairs; 

Time seems to falter in those dim, gray halls — 
The days are only footsteps on the stairs. 

The Basement yawned for tenants, but none came; 

It seemed completer for its emptiness. 
Gayheart had been its last. . . . To me the room 

Still wore the mantle of his soul's distress. 

I never saw his face but once again; 

It was a sharp cold midnight in the fall; 

[ 104 ] 



Broadway lay flaming like a polished sword, 
As though one night were given to flame its all. 

The theaters, bright-mouthed, poured forth a 
stream 

Of pallid faces that the glare struck dead. 
The street crawled, and the noise went up to God 

In formless cries, like some great need unsaid. 

The buffet of false brightness swept the night 
With rosy blushes to the firmament. 

Here ran the riot of a hoarded world, 
Here life was only reckoned to be spent! 

And here, carved In that graceless art of fire. 
Stood Gayheart's name, a star's height o'er the 
street. 
His words came back to me as clear as bells, 

" Their slaves are Failure, and their gods Defeat!'* 

Was this defeat, then? Was his fame defeat? 
' I knew the sort of comic thing he'd done. 
Had he forgot those ashes on his hands? 
Had he by hard forgetting played and won? 

[ 105 1 



Then suddenly I saw him in the crowd, 
Beneath that scarlet flaunting of his name. 

A smooth, smug mask of flesh was on him now; 
He was the very creature of his fame. 

His boyishness had died. . . . His hard, clean youth 
Was gone for ever 'neath a whelm of clay. 

Yet as I looked I saw him lift his head, 
And all his grossness seemed to fall away. 

His hungry look went straight to Heaven's throne. 
High up into the folded book of stars. 

And on his face I saw the Quest again — 
He was the seeker, fainting with his scars! 

One glimpse and he was gone, ... a soul blown on 
And lost at last beneath those painted skies. 

Yet he still lives! There never dawns a day 
But I behold him in the City's eyes. 



[io6] 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS 



SONG 

Love's on the highroad, 
Love's in the byroad — 

Love's on the meadow, and Love's in the mart! 
And down every byway 
Where I've taken my way 

I've met Love a-smiling — for Love's in my heart! 



[109] 



HARVEST 

There was a schooner came ashore this fall; 

A graceful thing flung on the bar and slain, 
With draggled gear, her stays about her trucks 

Like blown hair, . . . and her beauty all in vain. 

She floundered through the spray with crumpled 
wings, 

A gray bird smothered in a leaping doom. 
We huddled there at dawn to see her die, 

A circle of white faces in the gloom. 

There was a cold light reaping in the east, 
A slow scythe cutting at the field of stars, 

And wind to beat a strong man down. We stood 
Watching five dots that specked her tossing spars. 

Five human souls. . . . We saw the sea reach up 
And pluck at them with great white-fingered 
hands — 

[no] 



Three times the hfe-boat thrust against the surf; 
The sea laughed loud . . . and broke it on the 
sands. 

So there was nothing more to do. The end 

Came as the sun burst through its iron clouds. 
The racked ship staggered, reeled, and disap- 
peared — 
The flung spume served the dead men as their 
shrouds. 

And then, clear-voiced, the village church-bell sang 
Above the wind and sea. . . . We had forgot 

What day it was. Now suddenly w^e turned 
Together toward the house where death is not. 

No word was spoken, yet we all went in 

To the still aisles and knelt upon the floor. 

A man was there, a drunkard and a thief, 
One who had never been in church before. 

He kneeled beside us, twisting his red hands, 
A startled glory in his sodden eyes. . . . 

I thought of five men silent in the sea 

That one might bring his soul to paradise. 

[Ill] 



BALLAD OF DEAD GIRLS 

Scarce had they brought the bodies down 

Across the withered floor 
Than Max Rogosk}^ thundered at 

The District Leader's door. 

Scarce had the white-lipped mothers come 

To search the fearful noon 
Than Httle Max stood shivering 

In Tom McTodd's saloon. 

In Tom McTodd's saloon he stood, 

Beside the silver bar, 
Where any honest lad may stand 

And sell his vote at par. 

"Ten years I've paid the System's tax." 
(The words fell quivering, raw), 

"And now I want the thing I bought — 
Protection from the law." 

[112] 



The Leader smiled a crooked smile. 

"Your doors were locked," he said. 
"YouVe overstepped the limit, Max— 

A hundred women . . . dead!" 

Then Max Rogosky gripped the bar, 
And shivered where he stood. 

"You listen now to me," he cried, 
"Like business fellers should. 

"Fve paid for all my hundred dead, 
I've paid, I've paid, Tve paid. . . .' 

His ragged laughter rang, and died — 
For he was sore afraid. 

"I've paid for wooden hall and stair, 
I've paid to strain my floors, 

I've paid for rotten fire-escapes, 
For all my bolted doors. 

"Your fat inspectors came and came, 
I crossed their hands with gold. 

And now I want the thing I bought, 
The thing the System sold." 
8 [113] 



The District Leader filled a glass 

With whisky from the bar; 
(The little silver counter where 

He bought men's souls at par.) 

And well he knew that he must give 

The thing that he had sold, 
Else men should doubt the System's word, 

Keep back the System's gold. 

The whisky burned beneath his tongue: 

"A hundred women — dead! 
I guess the Boss can fix it up; 

Go home — and hide," he said. 

• ••••• 

All day they brought the bodies down 

From Max Rogosky's place. 
And, oh, the fearful touch of flame 

On hand and breast and face! 

All day the white-lipped mothers came 

To search the sheeted dead, 
And Horror strode the blackened walls 

Where Death had walked in red. 

[114] 



But Max Rogosky did not weep 
(He knew that tears were vain); 

He paid the System's price, and lived 
To lock his doors ag-ain. 



[IIS] 



LINCOLN 

I THINK he is not dead — I think his face 

Is in our faces, and his hands grope through 

Our hands when we do any kindnesses — 

And when we dream I think he means us to. 

I saw a man stand in a shrieking street 

Preaching a hopeless Cause. Deep in his eyes 

A glory flickered — and I knew he looked 
With other ecstasies at God's mute skies. 

He was a workman, risen to a Dream; 

His face was bitten as with sharp-edged swords — 
Yet he had gathered him a little world 

From life's loud street to hear his halting 
words — 

And we who listened, bound by some strange awe. 
Sensed the vague god shine through the dusty 
tramp, 

[ii6] 



Saw the dim Presence kneeling in his eyes, 
And that, I think, was Lincoln at his lamp. 

And so I say he is not dead; not he! 

He was too much a part of us to die. 
Deep in the street I see his faces go; 

His light is in my neighbor passing by. 



[117] 



THE DANCER 
(to mlle. anna pavlowa) 

The Wind has laid its dim commands 
Upon her feet, and hair, and hands — 

It seems she has nor will nor mind 
Save that white bowing to the Wind. 

Her body is a stem of grace 

That bears the flower of her face — 

And whitely through the mazing dance 
She treads with fairy elegance. 

Until the Wind blows swifter. . . . Then 
She flings beyond this mortal ken 

To some far heaven where it seems 
She dances at a Shrine of Dreams; 
[il8] 



Before the Threshold, yet untrod 

By aught save Life, and Death, and God, 

She dances in a great Wind's breath, 
A spirit in a mock of Death! 

Bears out the movement and the urge, 
The vital, vast, unending surge 

Of Life that goes with spirit red 
Against the stilled worlds of the dead. 

Whirls there, and wheels, and goes again, 
Until her hair is loosed like rain — 

Until her hands are like white doves 
That flutter in their Springtime loves; 

Until her lovely body flings 
Her eager spirit sudden wings — 

So in the hot flame of her dance 
Rebuilds earth's ancient radiance, 

[119] 



And with her gay, eternal youth 
Lays finger on the hidden Truth — 

Laughs at God's breast, while Life stands by, 
And, dancing on, flings Death the lie! 

All motion breathes within her mind— - 
She is a flower in the Wind. 

She is a leaf blown down the sea 
That men have named eternity — 

A woman, drawn to some dim goal 
By that mad butterfly, her soul! 



[120] 



THE HOME LAND 

My land was the West land; my home was on the 

hill. 
I never think of my land but it makes my heart 

to thrill; 
I never smell the west wind that blows the golden 

skies 
But old desire is in my feet and dreams are in my 

eyes. 



My home crowned the Highland; it had a stately 

grace. 
I never think of my land but I see my mother's 

face; 
I never smell the west wind that blows the silver 

ships 
But old delight is in my heart and youth is on my 

lips. 

[121] 



My land was a high land; my home was near the 

skies. 
I never think of my land but a light is in my eyes, 
I never smell the west wind that blows the summer 

rain — 
But I am at my mother's knee, a little lad again. 



[122] 



BALLAD OF THE DEAD KING 

The dead King lay in his stately hall; 

The guard paced slow, paced slow; 
The stars shone in at the shuttered port, 

The candles fluttered low. 

Sore wearied was the sleeping King, 

With all his kingdom's care. 
His face was like a winter's day — 

The snow was in his hair. 

The candles threw a broken light 

About his resting-place, 
And all the stillnesses of earth 

Were gathered on his face. 



It seemed he came a distant way 
Through harsh, unfriendly lands, 
[ 123 ] 



And laid his labor at God's feet, 
And slept with folded hands. 



Across the wall where life began 
Men stopped and praised the King; 

And Some One hauled the banners down, 
And made the bells to ring. 

And Some One said the King was good, 

And Some One wept aloud, 
And Some One labored night and day 

To make the King his shroud. 

But little Carl, the weaver's son, 
Who played beneath the wall. 

He laughed, as only childhood laughs. 
And tossed his bright new ball. 

"He gave me this, the tall, gray man," 

Thus Seven-Summers sang; 
And still they hauled the banners down, 

And still the dull bells rang. 
[124] 



"He stopped as he went riding by, 
And bought my ball for me." 

The childish laughter shrilled and died, 
The bells tolled ceaselessly. 



The dead King lay in the Halls of State, 
The guard paced slow, paced slow; 

The dawn came in at the shuttered port, 
And the candles flickered low. 

Sore wearied was the sleeping King 

With all his kingdom's care. 
His face was like a winter's day — 

The snow was in his hair. 

They bore him down at break o' day 

And laid him in his place; 
And all the stillness of the tomb 

Was gathered on his face. 

They sang his name in chanted psalms, 
They praised him, being dead; 

Their grief was like a wind of tears — 
^^He was the King!^' they said. 

[125] 



Then high above the sobbing wind 

All suddenly there came 
The tribute of the Secret Deed 

That has no thought of fame. 

Shrill, shrill it rose above the crowd, 
The fairest praise of all — 

The laughter of a little child 
Who played beneath the wall. 



[126] 



IN A WINDOW 

The world sits by an open window now, 
Parting the silver curtains of the rain 

With spirit hands and peering like a child — 
Searching the dusk for all its dreams again. 

No more I drowse beside the winter's hearth, 
Building my secret castles in the flame; 

Out of all houses now the soul must go. 
Seeking the thing that never had a name. 

Seeking the new, sweet ways across the grass, 
Seeking the little gods that ride the rain; 

Pausing to laugh with some fresh fluttered leaf, 
And going on . . . and going on again. 

Winter is dead with all her lily snows, 
Dead in the ashes of a lonely hearth. 

I sit beside an open window now 

Sending my soul for laughter down the earth! 

[127] 



LITTLE WHITE HEARSE 

Carry her softly, Little White Hearse, 

Down through the dusk of the careless street; 

She will be glad for the graveyard green 
And the wind that blow^s so sweet. 

Quick were her hands in the busy loom, 

But now they are crossed on her childish breast. 

Carry her softly. Little White Hearse; 
She will be glad for rest. 

She will be glad for the long, long sleep, 

And the night that breaks on a toilless day. 

Carry her gently, Little White Hearse, 
Down through the streets of play. 

Muffle thy sound, O Little White Hearse, 
Go through the town with a gentle tread. 

Why should we pause in our golden hours 
To know that a child is dead? 

[128] 



PEACE 

A BROAD blue water moving to the sea— 
A world asleep upon the water's edge — 

A wind that breathed the perfume of the pine — ■ 
A saintly lily floating in the sedge. . . . 

And through the dim cathedral of the wood 
A low light, burning like an altar flame, 

Where the stilled voices of withholden choirs 
Wove the slow shining musics of a Name. . . . 

And then afar upon the hilFs round breast 
A young girl, standing white and slim and fair, 

The rippled grasses going from her feet, 

The new stars like a circlet on her hair. . . . 

Then a song lifting, lifting to the stars, 

A reaping note that gathered all the peace — 

And said it cleanly to the twilit world 

As though to buy the day's worn soul release. . . . 
9 [129] 



And afterward the water moving on, 

And the last golden glory of the flame. . . . 

But I had heard the singing on the hill, 

And the hushed responsive musics of a Name! 



[130] 



BALLAD OF THE LATE JOHN FLINT 

The late John Flint he sat him down 

To banquet in his pride; 
A serving-man in scarlet cloth 

Stood humbly at his side; 
Across a bank of orchids sat 

His million-dollar Bride. 

The feast was done; the wedding wine 
In precious cups was poured. 

No other guest, John FUnt could swear, 
Was bidden to his board, 

Yet yonder sat a ghostly Thing 
And held an empty gourd. 

It had a beard of waving mist, 

A pale, unwinking eye; 
The hand that held the gourd was white. 

As hands of men who die. 

[131] 



Its face was many faces, each 
As bitter as a lie. 

The Bridegroom smiled a twisted smile; 

"The wine is strong," he said. 
The Bride she twirled her wedding-ring, 

Nor lifted up her head; 
And there were three at John Flint's board, 

And one of them was dead. 

The Bride she twirled her wedding-ring, 

And, ah, the Bride was fair! 
A rope of pearls burned her white throat — 

Bright jewels starred her hair; 
Her fingers lay in golden gaols — 

John Flint had put them there. 

All suddenly she raised her head: 

*'What seest thou?" she cried. 
The Bridegroom wet his lips with wine, 

Then swept the glass aside — 
His smile was like a crooked knife, 

And yet he smiled, and lied. 
[132] 



*'I only see my scarlet man 

Who serves me all the year; 
I only see my yellow cups 

That hold the wedding cheer — 
What moves you, Sweetling, that you look 

With such a face of fear?" 

The Bride she clutched the shining cloth — 

(The wine spilled warm and red 
Between the precious cups of gold) — 

"I am afraid," she said. 
"I am afraid of men who sit 

As though they saw the dead." 

"Nay, Sweet, and why should dead men leave 

Their graves to trouble me? 
The world knows well how much I gave 

To holy charity. 
Did I not move the Poorman's Bill 

That made the graveyards free?" 

His head sagged low, and from his lips 

A broken laughter fell; 
"I gave the poor their graveyards free 

Because I loved them well; 
[133] 



I swear — no man — may send — his ghost 
To drag — me — down — to helH" 

He stood erect, with staring eyes 

Fixed on the empty place; 
Then staggered like a stricken thing, 

And fell upon his face. . . . 
So lay upon his Sweetheart's breast 

In passionless embrace. 



The City Fathers tolled a bell 

And dolorously sighed; 
The Board of Trade embossed regrets 

And mailed them to the Bride, 
Who gave them to the serving-man, 

Who cast them all aside. 

The distant relatives flocked in — 

Pale uncles and proud aunts; 
But John Flint's Bride was young and fair, 

She loved to laugh and dance — 
She married John Flint's serving-man 

And went to live in France. 

[134] 



HILLS 

I HAVE remembered the hills through all my 
street; 
Though life press close, and Sorrow brush my 
hand, 
Still I have kept my last horizons sweet 
With all that memory of a lifted land. 

Safe from the years my windows hold them 
still. 

Far citadels from whence a glory streams! 
Upon their heights my spirit goes athrill 

And in my heart are old forgotten dreams. . . . 

You may look out and see them in the dawn, 
Their cowls thrust back, and crimson in their 
dress; 

For you are young, and splendidly withdrawn, 
And life has still its golden distances. 

[135] 



But I have walked a street with straining crowds, 
With surging men who would not say their 
names; 
We were no more than dust and dreams and 
shrouds, 
And dress and gold and little passing fames. 

And some there were who did not lift their eyes 
From the dun, bitter highway where we trod, 

But I was rich! Against the distant skies 
I saw the hill that raised my world to God! 



1 136] 



THE PARK 

All day the children play along the walks, 
A robin sings high in a brave, green tree, 

The city lifts gray temples at its marge. 
But still it keeps the heart of Arcady. 

Still blows a flower in the waving grass. 
Lifting a face of beauty to the sun; 

Still bursts the bough in joyous burgeoning — 
Still comes a lover when the day is done. 

Here the white moon, with magic in her train. 
Stoops from the starry lanes of paradise. 

And, with her ancient witchery of dreams. 
Lays some new hope upon a poet's eyes. 

See, on that bench beneath the drooping bough, 
Did not yon grief-bowed figure lift its face? 

Look how the moonlight finds him through the 
leaves, 
Touching his brow with sudden crowns of grace! 

[137] 



O little park, O little land of hope, 

Snatched from the world and held for God and 
me, 
Still through thy walks the w^istful cities go, 
Searching the dream that yet might set them 
free ! 



[138] 



ROSES IN THE SUBWAY 

A WAN-CHEEKED girl With faded eyes 

Came stumbling down the crowded car, 

Clutching her burden to her breast 
As though she held a star. 

Roses, I swear it! Red and sweet 

And struggling from her pinched white hands, 
Roses . . . like captured hostages 

From far and fairy lands! 

The thunder of the rushing train 

Was like a hush. . . . The flower scent 

Breathed faintly on the stale, whirled air 
Like some dim sacrament — 

I saw a garden stretching out 

And morning on it like a crown — 

And o'er a bed of crimson bloom 
My mother . . . stooping down. 

[139] 



BALLAD OF A CRUEL FATE 

" 7*^1? Piper Came Down from the Crest of the Hill" 

The Piper came down from the crest of the hill; 
His pipe it blew sweeter than any bird's trill. 
"I follow the road to the Morning," said he, 
"And who will go roving the highroad with me?" 

The King at his casement looked wistfully down; 
Said he: *'I would go were it not for my crown, 
But Fve battles to wage and Fve business to do, 
And I cannot go roving the highroad with you.'* 

The Piper strolled on with a smile in his eyes. 
His song swept the street as a wind sweeps the 

skies; 
"I follow the road of the Summer," said he, 
"And who will go roving the highroad with me?" 

A Banker leaned down from his window above; 
Said he: "I would go were it not for my love, 

[140] 



But Fve treasure to tend and Fve money to make, 
And I cannot go roving — for Phyllis's sake." 

The Piper turned into the clattering mart. 
He piped of the laughter that lay in his heart. 
"I follow the road of Contentment," said he, 
"And who will go roving the highroad with me?" 

A Merchant glanced up from his counter o' trade; 
Said he: "I would go if my debts were all paid, 
But Fve bargains to drive and I've mortgages due, 
And I cannot go roving the highroad with you." 

The Piper went on to the end o' the street. 
His song it blew wild and his song it blew sweet; 
**I follow the road to the Morning," said he, 
"And who will go roving the highroad with me?" 

A Beggar crawled out from the dusk of the Gate; 
Said he: "I would follow you early and late; 
Fm only a wastrel — a poor thing that begs — 
But, Lor', little Piper, I 'aven't no legs!" 



[141] 



OUT OF THE FOG 

Out of the fog Death rode with great, still bows; 

Then ship met ship with horrid agony- 
Steel locked and broke . . . the bloodied faces 
stared 

With sudden understanding at the sea. 

All movement ceased; the world was sick and 
still- 
Then footsteps beat the buckled deck, and 
cries 
Began . . . and all the humanness was gone, 
And light and life were little vanished lies. 

And there were women — futile, precious things; 
And round-faced babies that they clutched and 
kissed. 
And tearing wood, and the white name of God, 
And dead men dropping blackly through the 
mist. 

[ 142 ] 



Then through that hell a lad stood smiHng, calm: 
"Here, ma'am . . . take my belt. . . . Hurry 
now. . . . Good-by." 

Came the last shudder of the broken ship — 
And Youth once more had taught us how to die! 



1143I 



LOVE'S LIGHT WORLD 

Suppose I should fashion you Love's Hght world, 
With a cool, dim wood where the Spring shines 
through. 

And a hill beyond, where the sun stays late, 
And a thrush to sing in the hedge for you? 

Suppose I should paint you a silver brook. 
With violets marching in wind-blown crowds. 

And rushes to nod in a hidden nook, 
And lihes asleep like a nest of clouds? 

Suppose I should hollow a secret place 
With wild-rose edges and meadowsweet. 

And a little wind to spread the lace 
Of dream-spun cobwebs at your feet? 

Suppose I should build you a garden wall, 

With stars thrust over, and flowers tucked 
through, 

[ 144 ] 



And nightingales sobbing, and vines over all, 
And chinks where the gods may peep at you? 

Garden and wood and the hill beyond 

A hedge through the dawn and brook to the sea — 

Suppose I should fashion you Love's light world, 
Would you go there to live with Love and me? 



10 [ 145 ] 



THE JESTER 

Masters, I cannot make ye jest to-day; 

My laughter's left me like an outworn coat. 
Yonder the dead lie in their somber casques — 

I cannot get the gay song from my throat. 

Tears, tears! I feel them burn my blinded eyes, 
I cannot see my Masters for the tears. 

What are these dead to me? I know them not. 
Yet, see! I lay my poor jest at their biers. 

'Tis all I have — a Jester's faded mock- 
Yet if I weep for them 'tis not in vain. 

Slept they not there, the Fool and all his world 
Might not to-morrow make their jest again! 



[146] 



PAPER ROSES 

"How earnest thou by thy roses, Child?" 
'*I toiled at them in a little room." 

**Thy window flaming with the dawn?" 
*'Nay, master; 'twas in fearful gloom." 

"What gave thy rose its color, then?" 
"My cheek's blood, as I bent my head." 

"Thy cheek is cold and lifeless, Child." 
"Mayhap it was my heart that bled." 

"One white rose in thy basket. Child?" 
"Aye, master, that's to crown the whole." 

"What is it, then, O Little Child?" 
"Mayhap . . . mayhap it is my soul!" 



[147] 



HUMORESQUE 

(a.d. 2914) 

A PLOWMAN, toiling in a furrowed field, 
Turned up a pretty bauble with his steel. 

Stooped down and raised it in his great gnarled 
hands. 
Striking it lightly on his leathern heel. 

The mold shook loose; the gleam of gold showed 
through. 
The stare of jewels flicked the plowman's 
gaze — 
He bore the bauble to the market-square. 
The people gathered round him in amaze. 

But none knew what it was, its name or use, 
The pretty plaything that the lout brought 
down. 

Till rumor flew with rumor's nimbleness 
And fetched the only savant in the town. 

[148] 



He took It from the grinning plowman's hand — 
Studied it, while the folk stood in a ring. 

"Good sirs," said he, "a thousand years ago 
This bauble chafed the temples of a king/* 

The plowman whistled; then with impish mock 
He snatched the baub and set it on his head 

And ran back to his toiling in the field, 

Capped with the crown of royalty long dead. 

His fellows struck their hips and roared aloud, 
Vowing him better than a frisking troll — 

But the savant shook his solemn yellow mane. 
He said there might be meanings in it all. 



[149] 



THREE SWORDS 

Three blades from out the smithy fire 
He drew, and forged with starry blows. 

Beyond his door the skies of God 
Bloomed like an unplucked rose. 

"Three swords/* he said, "I make for you, 
O little Knight of Love and Youth! 

One blade is Knowledge, one is Faith, 
And one is Hope, forsooth." 

I was so young — and life, a rose 

That bloomed beyond the smithy door. 

"Give me the first," I cried, and rode 
Out like a Knight to war. 

Another year I came again — 

His forge was like a rose agleam. 

"Give me the second sword," I said, 
"That I may fight — and dream!" 
[ISO] 



The second sword lay in my hand, 

I rode once more, as Knights must do, 

But all my casque was wet with tears, 
And my heart's blood trickled through. 

Then came I back along the road, 
Thrice-ridden, till I saw his fire 

Glow redly through the bitter dusk 
Like a flower of desire. 

"The third," I gasped. "Give me the third, 
The last sword, that I fight and die!" 

Then turned again, and lo, I saw 
A dust of roses through the sky. 



[iSi] 



TO THE CITY 

Come out! The day has fallen like a rose 

Flung from the basket of a drunken god; 
Come out! The lights have made a street of 
stars, 

The golden street where Folly oft hath trod. 
Your mad, mad bells, your cloak of burning red. 
The little peaked cap upon your head! 
Come out, gay Dancer, to the court of night, 

To madness and the brimming bowl of joy; 
Here's last year's youth, patched till it's whole 
again. 

Here's last year's laughter — like a mended toy! 

Come out! Here's Love with crimson on his 
lips, 
Here's Life in motley, with a wine-glazed 
eye; 
The gods at wassail fling you down a rose. 
The petals of the daylight drift and die. 

[152] 



Here* s wine for wisdom and for truth a mask, 
Come, plunge your hands into the scarlet cask! 
Come out, come out, to shining artifice, 

To cups and capers and to all that's sweet; 
The world's a dancing-place; a laugh's enough — 

Come, here's a heart to tread beneath your feet! 



tiS3] 



SONG IN THE DUSK 

A Singer, passing on the star-flecked stream, 
Sang to the moon, in heaven's window framed, 

His dipping oar dragged silver through the dusk, 
His voice was full of music still untamed. 

The echoes lived and lived along the night 
Till they were old with ecstasy. . . . The note 

That clasps the meaning of a universe 

Lifted and thrilled from that far Singer's throat. 

I know not what he sang, this Voyageur, 
I only know it was his heart's desire; 

Within the cottage we sat listening, 

He with his years and I with dreams and fire. . . . 

Through the long twilight, till the dark grew deep. 
We sat together, silent, distant-eyed. 

In me there was a need of worlds to storm. 
In him it seemed that worlds on worlds had died. 

liS4] 



THE VASE 

The Potter rose up smiling in the dawn. 

Ere Heav'n had plucked the white stars from 
her hair, 

And with a daze of dream upon his eyes, 
Molded a vase surpassing smooth and fair. 

The red flow'r of the sun flamed up the sky, 
The bright shops cast the shutters from their 
hearts, 
A beggar 'gan his wailing in the dust. 

The merchants droned their loud wares through 
the marts. 

Yet still the Potter molded at his vase. 

Touched it with trembling hands until the 
day 
Passed, and the shadows strode the twisted 
street, 
Folding the light like some gay cloak away. 

[155I 



Then came the Potter to his house, and said, 
"See, I have done at last a perfect thing!" 

His women peered into his pouch for gold, 
And, seeing none, made angry muttering. 

But he with that dazed smile upon his eyes 
Put them aside, as shadows in a dream; 

And, weary with the labor of his soul, 

Lay down to slumber in the day's last gleam. 

Then came a crawling babe, the Potter's son. 
Caught up the vase with hands that clutched in 
vain, 

And while the women whispered in the door, 
Dashed the fair plaything into dust again. 



[156] 



IN A CAFfe 

The wine was cheap and red, 

But I smiled in your eyes as I quaffed, 
The tenor's voice was cracked and old, 
But the song that he sang was purest gold, 
And I looked in your heart and laughed. 

We were young, so young that zve did not care, 
For the world was all in our raptured eyes. 

Though the wine was cheap and the song zvas old. 
My heart, we were touching paradise. 

The cloth was patched and worn, 

But so w^as that jacket of mine, 
The fiddles were shaky and out of tune, 
But they gave us the world in a cloak of June, 

And we laughed as we sipped our wine. 

We were young, so young that we did not care, 
Though the cloth was old and the strings were wrong, 

[IS7] 



For the world was all in our dream-blind eyesy 
And a god leaned out of us through the song, 

A round-cheeked boy came by, 

With his violet merchandise. 
The blossoms were faded and smacked of the street, 
But they gave us a world that was April-sweet, 

And they deepened the blue in your eyes. 

We were young, so young that we did not care. 
Though the bloom be done and the light take wing. 

For heaven lay deep in our love-blind eyes, 

And the song in our hearts was a perject thing. 



[158] 



A FACE AT CHRISTMAS 

A WHITE face at the glowing window-pane, 
A face of Failure, weary and ill-scarred; 

Nor can the merry holly shut it out, 

Nor the bright Tree, flame-dressed and candle- 
starred. 

Eyes at our window, hearts! Nor all the light 
Of all our wicks can touch them into gleam; 

Deep in their dusk a soul with empty lamp 
Kneels at the crumbled altar of a Dream. 

How can I give the gifts of cloth and gold? 

How give but dross who might give paradise? 
My brother's hurt, laid at my door, is mine; 

Myself in judgment startles from his eyes. 

Myself and more! Myself and all men's selves. 
Bound in that look of his — that weary nod; 

[159] 



Though one bruised soul shall don the world*s 
defeat, 
Yet all souls share it. . . . And the sharing's God! 

A white face at my threshold! Fling the door — 

A house withholden is a house for sin! 
Call to the Tramp. . . . Yet hark, what voice 
replies ? 
What light leaps up, what Shining Guest comes 
in? 



[i6o] 



PILGRIM'S PRAYER ^ 

Love, when the day is done, 
When all the Light grows dim, 

When to the setting sun 
Rises the Vesper Hymn 

Let us stand heart to heart, 
We who have toiled so far. 

Bidding the day depart — 
Seeking the risen star! 



II [i6i] 



THE VAGRANT 

Give me my staff and my boots o' brown leather, 
And give me my cap with its bonny red feather; 
The gold dawn has stirred from the night's purple 

cavern, 
And silver's the road that leads down from the 

tavern. 

Then fill a last cup and we'll drink to the parting, 
The day's at the door, and it's soon I'll be starting — 
Farewell then, ye houselings, old ties we must sever; 
Farewell for a day, hearts, or farewell for ever! 

Haply no more we may meet at this table. 
While night at the window hangs star-dusted sable. 
Or sing a good song as we tipple together — 
For life's but a cat's-paw, and man's but a feather. 

So now fare-ye-well, lads, and grant ye fair measure; 
A lass for your faith and a glass for your pleasure. 

[162] 



My love's at the doorway, all dewy and glowing, 
A rose in her hands and her wild tresses blowing! 

Then give me my staff and my boots o' brown 

leather, 
And give me my cap with its bonny red feather; 
My love's in the doorway; old ties we must sever. 
Farewell for a day, hearts, or farewell for ever! 



[163I 



HOUSE OF YEARS 

A ROOM of joy; a room of tears, 
This is my House of Years! 

Wherein I walk with blinded feet 
Through bitter halls and sweet; 

Through windowed rooms where all lights are 
Of land and sea and star — 

Through doors of dark where no lamps gleam; 
Through doors of dawn and dream! 

Through room of Song and room of Moan, 
All through my House — alone. 

With echoed step and closing door 
Until I walk no more — 

Then one last Room where old heads nod, 
And peace, and sleep, and God! 

[164] 



" THREE MEN 0' MERRI '* 

There were three men o* Merri, 

That lies along the sea; 
They swore the oath of Salt and Wind 

That they would hold them free 
From woman's charms and woman's arms 

And woman's witcher}^ 

And Eric met a fisher-lass 

A-walking on the sand; 
*'The sea is Loneliness," she said, 

And touched him with her hand, 
And smiled into his blinded eyes — 

And wed him to the land. 

And Petri watched a bold girl dance, 

With paint upon her lips; 
The light fell from the tavern lamp 

And touched her finger-tips 
Like marriage-gold! Another man 

Hails out in Petri's ships. 

[165] 



And Barrac, of the heart of brass, 
Red-maned and huge of arm, 

He laughed and kissed a woman's Hps 
And found them fresh and warm— 

And went across the Httle hills 
And squatted on a farm. 

The Moral of this simple tale 

Is plain enough to see; 
There is no oath to bind a man 

From woman's witchery — 
At least I know that it is so 

In Merri, by the sea. 



[1661 



THE TEACHING 

"How learned thou thy song, Pierrot?" 

"By yesterday's sorrow." 
"What set ye to singing?" 

"The hope o' to-morrow." 

"Who taught thee thy jest, Pierrot?" 

"A fool and his winning." 
"What led ye to say it?" 

"The folly o' sinning." 

"What gave thee thy laughter, Pierrot?" 

"A king in his power." 
"What moved ye to sound it?" 

"The flight of an hour." 

" How learned thou of love, Pierrot ?" 

"By all that is holy. 
By Dream and by Song — • 

And my heart breaking slowly!" 

[1671 



IMPRESSION 

This I remember of the long day's boon; 
The sun's red going, and the risen moon; 
The road half bound with shade, and struggling 

free, 
And my love laughing by a golden sea! 

I have forgot a thousand lovely skies, 
But not that dusk-hid heaven of her eyes! 
And there comes never any song to me 
But my love's voice returning from the sea. 

This I remember of the whole day's sweet; 
The moon, with her great water at her feet; 
And my love calling, from the road that ran 
Into the shadows where our world began! 



[i68] 



THE SINGING 

Last night I sang with careless heart, 
Indifferent who should hear my song. 

And mockingly I took the gold 
Flung by the drifting throng. 

To-night you crossed the little Square. . . , 
A glory filled the bitter street. 

I sang for Love, and singing's sake — 
And the gold lay at my feet. 



[169) 



CHRISTMAS PRAYER 

God grant no little child may go 
With hungry heart or empty hand — 

Give this Thy world one radiant day 
To understand, to understand! 

Give us the fitting word to say, 

The spendthrift smile, the brave caress; 

Disclose our hearts, and give us now 
The courage of our tenderness! 

Lord, we are old with toil and tears, 

Our souls are veiled with various art. 

Yet still the little children keep 
Thine ancient simpleness of heart — - 

And they alone of all Thy breath 
May bind the burning AngeFs eyes. 

And striking laughter from the Sword, 
Retrace the years to Paradise. 
[170] 



They are so brave with love and dreams, 
So eager-eyed, and, ah, so dear — 

I think we must return them now 
The faith they bore across the year. 

I think that we must give them now 
The spendthrift smile, the kindly word, 

That earth may keep its ancient Hope 
And we Thy full commandments, Lord. 



[171] 



THE RIDDLE 

We were laying the road to a Riddle, 

And never a man knew why, 
Nor Oleson, nor little Giuseppe, 

Nor Sandy McGregor, nor I; 
It lay on the hills before us, 

And the hills were strange with its gleam. 
And mayhap the Thing v/as a City, 

And mayhap 'twas only a dream. 

We started our picks in the morning, 

We quit when we came to the stars. 
We held out our hands to the camp-fire 

And told off the miles by the scars; 
Long miles that we laid with our labor. 

And never a man knew why. 
Nor Oleson, nor little Giuseppe, 

Nor Sandy McGregor, nor I. 

We sat by the fire at twilight 
And guessed at it gleaming there, 
[172] 



With a little red cloud above it 
Like the rose in a woman^s hair! 

And all of us held by the guesses 
And toiled to the visions they made, 

And some of us wondered, and cursed it, 
And some of us wondered — and prayed. 

But each of us cherished his vision 

And fought for his guess in the gloam, 
And one of us dreamed it was heaven, 

And one of us dreamed it was Home. 
Old Sandy McGregor saw heather, 

And moorland and thistle-blown sod — 
And little Giuseppe stood forward. 

And guessed it was Naples — or God. 

Then Oleson, the Swede, broke the silence; 

He surged to his feet like a tide 
And said it was Snow on a Mountain, 

And turned to his blanket — and cried. 
But how could I tell them my vision? 

A rose in a woman s hair — 
Mary — and Spring in Killarney — 

And never a face inore fair! 
[173I 



We were new and strange to the country 

As we laid the long road through, 
And all of us had our guesses, 

But none of us really knew. 
Old Sandy, he toiled to the heather, 

And little Giusep' to the sea, 
The Swede laid his road to a mountain. 

But it was Killarney to me! 

Four of us, laying a roadway. 

And never a man knew why. 
Nor Oleson, nor little Giuseppe, 

Nor Sandy McGregor, nor I. 
The road ran on to a Riddle, 

The hills were strange with its gleam! 
And mayhap the Thing was a City, 

And mayhap 'twas only a dream. 



[174] 



"I HAVE SO LOVED THE DAY" 

I HAVE SO loved the glory of the Day, 

From surging dawn to wondrous setting sun, 

I think some light must linger on my eyes. 
When life is done. 

I think some glow of sunset or of dawn 
Must touch the sleeping altars of my soul, 

So they who look into my face at last 
Shall wonder of my goal — 

So they who come at twilight with wet eyes 
Shall look upon my stillness, smile and go — 

A little surer of their Paradise 
Because I loved life so. 



[i7Sl 



THE OTHER SIDE THE HILL 

The other side the hill, 

Where the water-lilies are, 
There's a pirate ship a-riding, 

With the moon-mist on her spar; 
And the bucaneers are waiting 

Till the winds o' dawn shall blow, 
And the day will be at morning 

When they go, when they go. 

The other side the hill. 

Where the lilies lie so pale, 
There's a pirate ship a-sleeping 

With the moon-mist in her sail; 
And the captain, he is seven. 

And the crew is six or so, 
And the day will be at dawning 

When they go, when they go. 

The other side the hill. 

Where the water silver gleams, 

[176] 



There's a pirate ship a-waiting 

For the plunder cruise o' dreams — 

And the stars will soon be paling, 
And the winds o' dawn will blow, 

And my heart, it will be breaking 
When they go, when they go! 



12 



[177] 



THE ADVENTURER 

I NEVER have gone sailing, sailing on the sea; 

The winds that sing to sailormen have never sung 
to me; 

Yet I have heard the Voice that calls the sea- 
winds to their blowing, 

And I have known the glory of the galleons out- 
going! 

I never have gone strolling, strolling from the Road, 

For me no meadow-path has wound, nor little 
brook has flowed; 

Yet I have known the Dream that lights the by- 
way through the clover. 

And I have heard the voices calling, all the long 
world over. 

The other lads go roving, roving down the world; 
For me no road has stretched away, nor gipsy 
sail unfurled; 

[178] 



Yet I have seen the blue sea break upon the 
yellow sands, 

And I have known the fullness of the earth be- 
tween my hands! 



Between my hands, and all my own, both dawn 

and evening star — 
And, ah, to slough my toil and go where all the 

new dreams are. 
Beyond the outer rim of seas, beyond the heart's 

unrest. 
To Arcady that does not lie by East or South or 

West — 



That does not lie by West or East, nor yet by 

North or South, 
Nor at the foot of distant hills, nor by the river's 

mouth, 
Yet lies somewhither, up the world or down the 

world I know. 
Else why should God have given me the youth 

to dream it so? 

[179] 



1 never have gone boldly, boldly to the free! 

Yet I have seen the shining sails that fleck the 
outer sea, 

And I have heard, across the Road, the vagrant 
thrushes sing, 

Wherefore my soul has sped away to great ad- 
venturing! 



[i8o] 



AUTUMN 

Swiftly my heart, while fades the summer rose, 
Speak thou of love, ere Youth and Love grow 
cold! 

The year hath turned her face unto the snows. 
The earth is old, is old. 

Now, while the flushed leaf falters from the btjugh, 
Speak of thy love, and, ah, speak soon, speak 
soon! 

God flings us no deep day to laze in now, 
Nor masks His face with June — 

The brief suns fall like petals from the rose, 
The days dawn whiter than a wheeling dove. 

Heart o' my heart, before we face the snows. 
Speak thou of love, of love! 



[i8l] 



THE PRODIGAL 

Had I the golden days of June 
To spend again, to spend again, 

The yellow treasures of the moon, 
The slow, sweet silver of the rain, 

I know what bargains I would drive 
With Autumn's sad-eyed chatelaine. 

I know what purchase I would make 
With my bright trove of summer gold, 

I know that I would buy me now 
A crackling fire from the cold — 

A flame of all the withered days 

That flutter down, when hearts are old. 

Oh, I would buy the fee o' faith. 
To stay me as the nights grow long, 

A corner by the glowing hearth 

To dream in when the shadows throng- 

[182] 



And I would buy my weary heart 

The right to croon a last, sweet song. 

To-day the sun was spent so soon 

I had no time for any play; 
The evening found me still at toil; 

There was no laughter in the day; 
And, ah, that I had saved a tithe 

Of all the hours I flung away! 

But June's the month of prodigals, 

And who has youth must laugh and spend, 

For every lass has smiles to trade. 
And every lad's a needy friend — 

And never looms the reckoning. 

And never gleams the journey's end. 

And so I spent the stars o' June, 
And so I spent the summer rain, 

And now the solemn harvesters 

Are come to reap the ripened grain, 

And, oh, had I but Youth and Love 
To spend again, to spend again! 

[183] 



I know what I would buy me now, 
With all my wealth o' vanished gold— 

A corner by the glowing hearth, 

To shield me from the winter's cold, 

And Love to sit beside me there 

And keep my heart from growing old. 



[184] 



HUNGER 

The Starving Men thej^ walk the dusk 

With hunger in their eyes. 
To them a Lighted House is like 

A lamp of Paradise. 

It is the Window in the dusk 
That marks the drifter's coast; 

It is the thought of love and light 
That mocks the drifter most. 

Now I have been a Starving Man 
And walked the winter dusk; 

And I have known how life may be 
A Heaven and a Husk. . . . 

The Fainting Folk they pulled my sleeve. 
And bade me curse the Light. 

But I had seen a Rich Man's face 
That looked into the night. 
I i8S 1 



A hungry face, a brother face, 

That stared into the gloom. 
And starved for life and starved for love 

Within a lighted room! 



[i86] 



THE BRIDE 

Fling her your roses, red and white; 
She is the Queen of the world to-night: 



Back from the Altar, 

Turning slow, 

Fire and Flower, Dust and Snow — 



She is the Hope of the world to-night. 
Fling her your roses, red and white. 



Woman and Angel, 

Wife and Maid, 

Bold with the Giving, yet all afraid. 



Fling her your roses, red and white; 
She is the Youth of the world to-night! 

[187] 



Fire o' Spring, 

And Faith o' Years, 

Laughter and Wonder, Love and Tears. 

Fling her your roses, red and white; 
She is the Queen of the world to-night! 



i88] 



THE RAGGED PIPER 

There is a ragged Piper walks the byways of the 

town, 
His eyes are small and twinkling, and his cheeks 

are full and brown; 
He strolls the streets at twilight when the sun is 

sinking low, 
And he sings fa, la, la, lorum and fa, la, la, lum, ti, o! 

A stranger song was never piped beneath the 

stars o' June, 
And yet I trow it has a worth beyond the common 

tune. 
Whatever you would have it mean, it means just 

that, you know. 
With its fa, la, la, la, lorum and its fa, la, lum, ti, o! 

The goodwives of the town come out and lean 

above the gate. 
And fold their hands across their hearts, and 

wait, and wait, and wait; 

[189] 



And when they hear the Piper's song they Hft 

their hands and say, 
"He's singing o' the silken gown I looked at 

yesterday." 

Fa, la, la, la, la, lorum and fa, la, la, lum, 

ti, o! 
You hear it in the highways when the sun is 

sinking low. 
And if you're just turned twenty, and your heart 

is in the moon, 
You'll swear it's love that runs so sweet within the 

Piper's tune. 

Across the village thresholds with the roses climb- 
ing over. 

The pretty lasses wait until they hear the merry 
rover. 

Then down they dance with laugh and shout, to 
tread the moonbeams' lace. 

And de'il a one but thinks the tune has praised 
her to her face. 

Fa, la, la, la, la, lorum and fa, la, la, lum, 
ti, o! 

[190] 



You hear it in the byways when the sun is sink- 
ing low; 

And the wee tots at the windows, and the lovers 
by the streams, 

They wonder how the Piper guessed the song to 
fit their dreams! 

Beside the dying embers in their corners of the 

hearth 
The old men sit and plan their ways across a 

fairer earth, 
And on their ears the Piper's song falls like a 

faint caress 
Of old, forgotten voices blurred with new-world 

tenderness. 

Fa, la, la, la, la, lorum and fa, la, la, lum, 

ti, o! 
You hear it through the houses when the sun is 

sinking low, 
And the poets in their attics don the plumage of 

their quills. 
And send their souls by wing o' song to God*s 

eternal hills. 

[191] 



Fve never seen this fellow with his silly wordless 

tune, 
But to-night I heard his merry pipe beneath the 

full gold moon; 
And straightway I began to pen this brilliant 

ballad-o, 
Fa, la, la, la, la, lorum and fa, la, la, lum, ti, o! 



[192] 



SISTERS OF THE CROSS OF SHAME 

The Sisters of the Cross of Shame, 

They smile along the night; 
Their houses stand with shuttered souls 

And painted eyes of light. 

Their houses look with scarlet eyes 

Upon a world of sin; 
And every man cries, "Woe, alas!" 

And every man goes in. 

The sober Senate meets at noon. 

To pass the Woman's Law, 
The portly Churchmen vote to stem 

The torrent with a straw. 

The Sister of the Cross of Shame, 
She smiles beneath her cloud — 

(She does not laugh till ten o'clock. 
And then she laughs too loud.) 

13 [ 193 ] 



And still she hears the throb of feet 

Upon the scarlet stair, 
And still she dons the cloak of shame 

That is not hers to wear. 

The sons of saintly women come 
To kiss the Cross of Shame; 

Before them, in another time, 
Their worthy fathers came. 

And no man tells his son the truth. 

And no man dares to tell; 
And Innocence goes laughing through 

The little doors of hell. . . . 

The Sisters of the Cross of Shame, 
They smile along the night. 

And on their shadowed window-sills. 
They place a scarlet light — 

They place a scarlet light to draw 
The soul that flutters by — 

And still the portly Churchman prays. 
And still the young men die. 
[194I 



And still the portly Churchmen pray, 
And still the Senate meets, 

And still the scarlet houses stand 
Along the bitter streets — 

And no man tells his son the truth, 
Lest he should speak of sin; 

And every man cries, **Woe, alas!" 
And every man goes in. 



[195] 



POEM FOR EASTER 

The roses on my Lady's hat 
Are colored like the dawn — 

The crimson of a child's round cheek 
Before its life is drawn. 

The lilies at my Lady's breast 
Are pale as driven snow — 

The color of the dead child's face 
Who toiled to make them so. 



[196] 



IN A DEATH HOUSE 
(spring) 

TiiEY tell me it Is Spring again 

Beyond the prison wall; 
They tell me that the hollyhocks 

Have flowered and grown tall — 
But I have crossed another day 

From those that are my all. 

The thrush that thrills the scented wood 

With flutings to his mate, 
The gold-cheeked day that sinks to rest 

Beyond the western gate, 
Have only forged another link 

To bind me to my fate. 

A link of song, a link of sun 

And bitterer for that; 
Say I: If man must die for sin 

Give him a good black hat, 
[ 197 ] 



Bind up his eyes with cloths of night 
And kill him like a rat. 

But light and song are freedom's wear, 
And even death-doomed men 

However they may lock their brains 
Fall dreaming now and then, 

And see the white-topped daisy-fields 
Go marching up a glen. 

And that is worse than any death 

That mortal man may die; 
To see a hill within the soul 

And stone walls with the eye, 
To make a mark upon a slate 

And mean a day gone by. 

That is the measure of the woe 
My world must have of me; 

Slow torture of a thousand dreams, 
That mark the soul set free: 

Remembered wings against the sky. 
Remembered sails at sea. 

(198] 



It is the thought, it is the dream 

That swells the price I pay. 
And why should any world of flesh 

Fling its own flesh away? 
If I have still the soul to dream 

I am not worthless clay! 

I would the fools who judged me here 

Within a cell of stone, 
Might sit beside me one long night, 

Or, better, sit alone, 
And think of Spring and birds and hills, 

And hollyhocks, half grown. . . . 

Oh, had my Judges wit enough, 

And courage to be wise. 
They still might drag the blood-stained hand 

Into the midnight skies, 
To grip at gods and grasp at stars 

And cling to Paradise. 

My Priests do not deny me God, 
But earth denies me man. 
[199I 



She puts a value on my soul 

That lifts the future ban; 
She sends me up to Heaven's door 

To break it if I can. 

She might have done a finer thing 

And kept me at her side; 
What will she make of all my dust 

When I have paid and died? 
The justice that she murders with 

Is only wasted pride. 

Because my hand is scarlet-stained 

With Cain's most scarlet blot, 
My Judge must thrust his finger-tips 

Into that selfsame pot, 
And kill with judgments, calm and cold, 

Where I killed flaming hot! 

"Who kills must pay," my Judges cry. 
And straightway wield the knife. 

Come, then, Fll pay with dreams and death, 
And you shall pay with life. 

You shall pay drop by living drop 
For Tears and Hate and Strife! 
[200] 



You shall not know the utmost worth 

Of any living thing; 
You shall not know how Heaven hangs 

Upon a swallow's wing, 
Or how God's very all may be 

A daisy-field in Spring! 

I have a treasure in my soul 

That all my world has not; 
For I have measured life and love 

Against my hand's red blot, 
And I know now that slaying cold 

Is worse than slaying hot. 

You will not take the priceless thing 
That looks out from my eyes; 

You will not make my stain a star. 
And set it in the skies, 

You will not take the word of hell 
To prove your Paradise! 

So I shall die; a wasted thing, 
For want of better price; 
[201 ] 



A prey to Justice that must fall 

As blind as whited dice, 
But they who judged me here shall pay 

An endless sacrifice. . . . 

They tell me it is Spring again 

Beyond the prison pall; 
They tell me that the hollyhocks 

Have flowered and grown tall, 
But I have crossed my life's last day 

From those upon my wall. 

A death-doomed man may sometimes dream 

Beyond life's little door; 
And, dreaming, come at last to see 

Flis matter to the core, 
And know himself more fit to live 

Than e'er he was before. 

They tell me that the grass is green 

Upon the prison lawn; 
They tell me that there lives a light 

When all the day is gone — 
They think it is an evening light, 

O Blind! It is the dawn! 
[ 202 ] 



IN A GARRET 

Four walls, eh? 

Ceiling cracked and smudged, you say? 
Nonsense, it*s heaven if you have the eye 
To twist gray plaster into vaulted sky! 
And here's the little daub that Petri made, 

Petri, the artist, from the floor below, 
Who laughs and says that dreams are not a trade. 

Better, I think, because he loved it so, 
Far better than if he had preened his wit 
To trick some fat purse into buying it. 
Now like a god he gives his painted sea 
And one white ship that sets the whole room free, 
Blots the gray wall and lifts a gallant wing 
For our adventuring! 

Four walls, eh? 

Come, let's crumble them away! 
You and I, 

Build us a world of sea and sail and sky. 

[ 203 ] 



The mind gives title where the law gives none. 
The soul has more possessions than the sun. 
Here's Petri's art! That proves a man may go 

Into more worlds than wait upon his purse. 
See, where his brush has made the water glow! 

That's wealth without wealth's curse. 
And here v/here morning trembles on the skies 
Is freedom and a hint of paradise. 
And you and I have love! Shall we not dare 

Farther than Petri? Here's the lamp of art 
Lighting the road. . . . Come, there are worlds to 
share, 

And you and I shall share them, my heart! 



[204] 



THE DREADNOUGHT 

One Fall they sent a fighting-ship to sea, 

With wine-stained bows, and pennants stream- 
ing gay- 
Men watched her from the docks: said she was 
fair, 
And felt their hearts lift as she dimmed away. . . . 

She was the triumph of the world she sailed, 
The sea's supremest, proud and tall and fair; 

We watched her to the far horizon's rim 
Until her smoke thinned to a single hair; 

Then, turning, said one man with withered eyes: 
"She'll last her day, and then she'll rot and 
die. 
To-morrow, matey, they'll invent her death 
Somewhere beyond that point she touched the 
sky"— 

[205] 



His vague hands fluttered in their prophecy, 
"Somewhere across the world they'll sweat and 
scheme, 

And break their hearts behind their secret doors, 
To find a murderer for Steel and Steam. . . . 

"A German, mebbe, or a Japanee 

Will guess at heavier guns — and then she'll 
fall. 
I know her breed! I fought the Merrimac 

In sixty-two. . . . What benefits it all?" 

But we, who still stood watching her dark hair, 
Mocked him to silence: one by one we hailed 

Her strength, her beauty — smiled and drifted on. 
Boasting that we had seen her as she sailed. 



Three years she reigned; three years we spoke of 
her. 
Vaunting her name along the waterside; 
Then came the news — a newer, foreign ship 
Of heavier guns. . . . Slowly our old faiths 
died. 

[206] 



Another Fall we gathered on the docks, 

To watch her creep back through the autumn 
rain; 

Her men stood dully at her sullen breasts, 
Knowing that she would never sail again. 

She came like some vast Sorrow, brooding, slow. 
Damned by her dead perfection, hugely sad; 

I heard a voice behind me in the rain: 

"Three years! Three little years is all she 
had"— 

The rain dripped down, and then the voice again: 
"Three years! My youngest died three years 
ago- 
Plain starved, they said. . . . And yonder in the 
Roads. . . . 
Ah, mates, in God's name why should life be 
so?" 

We turned; a man stood with uplifted hands, 
A laborer, with Death upon his face, 

And in his eyes the dumb bewilderment 
Of those who wear injustice for the race. 

[ 207 ] 



And still the great, gray ship came creeping in. 
Sullen and sad. ... I heard his laugh ring wild: 

"For what it costs to feed her lightest gun 
I might have saved my little child . . . my 

chiidr 

A vision smote us of an Iron God 

That taxed the world with fearful wrack and 
pain; 
We saw the unguessed sacrifice of souls — 

Dead faces on the canvas of the rain. . . . 

Then suddenly a man with withered eyes 

And vague, wan hands came leering through 
the crowd — 

*'I said she'd fall," he quavered, gesturing; 
"I know her breed! The Merrimac was proud. 

"But, mates, she passed." . . . His voice trailed 
off; was still. 

There was no sound except the drear rain's fall. 
We watched the dead ship creeping to her grave — 

I thought again: what benefits it all? 

[208] 



"WHO DREAMS SHALL LIVE'* 

Who dreams shall live! And if we do not dream 

Then we shall build no Temple into Time. 

Yon dust cloud, whirling slow against the sun, 

Was yesterday's cathedral, stirred to gold 

By heedless footsteps of a passing world. 

The faiths of stone and steel are failed of proof. 

The King who made religion of a Sword 

Passes, and is forgotten in a day. 

The crown he wore rots at a lily's root. 

The rose unfurls her banners o'er his dust. 

The dreamer dies, but never dies the dream, 
Though Death shall call the whirlwind to his aid. 
Enlist men's passions, trick their hearts with hate. 
Still shall the Vision live! Say nevermore 
That dreams are fragile things. What else endures 
Of all this broken world save only dreams! 



14 



[209] 



WAYFARERS 

They were met in the Last Inn's tap-room, where 
the road strikes hands with the sea, 
And one was come from a weary ship that 
slept with folded sail, 
And one was come from the brown highroad that 
spins across the lea, 
The third sat by the glowing hearth and sipped 
a mug of ale. 



The sailor said: *'It's good to be where warmth 
and safety are. 
I'm weary of great waters and the never-broken 
sky; 
Fm sick of hanging dizzy to the death-end of a 
spar; 
I want another sort of life before I come to 
die. 

[210] 



"I want a bit of meadow, where the grass is to 
my knees, 
And a little patch where I can kneel and watch 
the green things grow. 
I want to look at flowers, cool my eyes with 
blooms and trees. 
I am weary of great waters where the blind white 
vessels go.*' 



The landsman said: *'The sea is wide and ships 
are graceful things, 
No man may say his life is done until he dares 
the deep. 
When I was but a lad I dreamed of vessels with 
white wings, 
And ghostly galleons made bold adventure of 
my sleep. 



I know a little meadow, like the hollow of God*s 

hand. 
And if you have a mind to trade Til tell you 
where it lies, 

[211] 



And I will take your seaman*s berth and you will 
take my land. 
And you will look at blossoms for the cooling 
of your eyes. 



"But I will look at naked things and find their 
utmost worth, 
Learn wisdom from the Book of Stars that 
guides me through the wave. 
Your life for mine! Come, will you trade blue 
water for brown earth?" 
"Aye," said the sailor. "Life for life and grave 
for certain grave." 



The drinker by the fire stirred and spake with 
curling lips. 
"What fools," he said, "what fools ye be!" and 
looked into their eyes. 
"Let landsmen cleave unto the land and sailors 
keep their ships, 
For he who seeks to prove a dream shall lose 
his Paradise!" 

[212] 



The morning thrust a golden face in at the tavern 
door, 
The day wind blew upon the sea and rippled 
through the grass, 
And one man sailed in a white-winged ship and 
one stayed on the shore, 
The third sat by the glowing hearth and smiled 
Into his glass. 



[213 ] 



MY SAINT LIES SLEEPING 

My saint lies sleeping, robed in white, 

A single lily at her breast, 
The sum of all her perfect years 

In one white bloom expressed. 

A lily in her folded hands 

And over all her stillness. Light, 

As one who bears a lamp into 
The contemplated night. 

Oh, more than all inspired words 
Of God's most shining ministers 

Earth finds its hope of heaven proved 
In that sure faith of hers. 

Then wake her not with any tears 
From out her miracle of rest; 

She sleeps, with all her perfect years 
Laid whitely at her breast. 
[214] 



And so, farewell! For Love and Hope 
Shall stand as angels at her tomb, 

But, ah, to bear the silent house, 
The aching, empty room! 



[2IS] 



SONG FOR YOUTH 

Gather all the sweet of May 
Lock it tenderly away, 
Precious night and perfect day. 

Make a trove of shining things, 
Roses, raindrops, dreams, and wings; 
Catch a skylark while he sings! 

Gather all the summer's sweet, 
Hush of heaven, song of street. 
Stars that dance on silver feet! 

While thy breath is young and warm, 
While love nestles in thy arm. 
Take thy trove and weave a charm. 

Then grow old with gallant ease, 
For I'm told such wealths as these — 
Make the fairest memories! 

[216] 



THE VAGABOND 

Old Time has turned his pockets out 

And here's a golden day. 
And if I spend it foolishly 

There's none to say me nay! 

Tramping down the highroady 

Spending as I go. 
Sleeping in the shadowed dales 

Where the daisies blow. 
Waking with the meadozv-larks, 

When the world's aglow! 

Emperors have purple cloaks, 
x^nd vagabonds have none, 

But who will wear the lighter crown 
When all the roads are run? 

Light upon the hilltops, 
Qlory in, the sky! 
[217] 



Who zuill have the cleaner gold 

When we come to die? 
Who will have the greater wealth. 

Emperor or I? 

Time has turned his pockets out 

And here's a bit of gold, 
And you will hoard, and I will spend, 

And we will both grow old. 

When the count is settled. 

Who shall profit more. 
You who hoarded God away? 

I who spent my store? 
Who will lay the richer heart 

Down at Heaven s door? 



[218] 



LIFE 

A LITTLE road went laughing 

From the willows by the stream; 
It ran to dust-gold distance, 
Dropped, and lifted all agleam; 
Tripped, and fell into a hollow, 
Where it called to me to follow — 
And I followed it as children do the byways of 
a dream. 

It spun through shining grasses 

Where the feet of Spring had gone. 
And it stole down to the brookside 
Like a timid thirsty fawn; 

Kissed the reed-rush, and thereafter, 
With a sort of breathless laughter, 
Spurned the plain and stormed the mountain 
like a footpath of the dawn! 

So, laughing, reached the summit 
By an ancient water-stair; 

[219] 



Poised on high as though to venture 
Further journeys through the air; 
And so, hov'ring, drew me even 
To the outer edge of heaven — 
Drew me outward to the utmost edge — and 
laughed, and left me there. 



[ 220] 



POEMS ABOUT TOWN 



THE WOOLWORTH BUILDING 

I AM one of the things at your feet, 
I have laughter and hope and tears — 

But you have the Clouds and the Wind, 
And the hallowed defiance of years. 

You are stufF of the dreams that I dream; 

You are Beauty, made tall and white, 
And you live with your foot on the rock. 

And your face to the fountains of light! 

I am part of the world at your feet, 
I have sorrow and laughter and days, 

But you have unmeasurable dawns, 
And the firmness outlasting the phase. 

You are God in a sermon of stone. 

The dim God that we search at your feet; 

You are faith lifted unto the stars. 

But we do not look up from our street. 
[223 ] 



We do not look up from our tears, 

To call you divine as we go; 
But you are the temple we built, 

And then did not know, did not know! 



[224] 



JIMSY 

JiMSY is a little chap, 
Only nine or so; 

Has to use a wooden crutch 
(Says it doesn't bother much) 
Jimsy's lame, you know. 



Jimsy has a cheery way — 
Never saw him glum — 

Jimsy's face is sort o' thin, 
But you ought to see him grin, 
Cheers a fellow some! 



Jimsy's got a yellow dog — 
Sorry little tyke! 
Never leaves his master's side- 
Guess he'd die if Jimsy died — 
Never saw the like. 
15 [ 225 ] 



Jimsy greets me every night— 
"Here's yer poiper, Boss." 
When the other newsies play, 
Jimsy turns his eyes away — 
That is Jimsy's cross. 

If I ever do a thing 

Brave or kind or true, 

If I give a squarer deal — 
It's because I sort o' feel 

Jimsy 'd want me to. 



[226] 



THE WINDOW POSTER 

We stood, a little wistful, shivering group, 
Before a window. It was such a day 

As March wears in her wildest moods; but we 
Walked a blue city by a sapphire bay. 

Above us bowed the courtiers of the palms, 
Stirred to a stately homage by the breeze; 

A jeweled city slumbered at our feet. 

Clasped in the arms of tender, languid seas. 

A vagabond stole in beside me then, 

A graybeard with a pinched cheek and a cough. 

He said: "Td like right well to go there, pard, 
Just once before my trouble takes me ofF. . . ." 

A little woman with a face of crowds, 

And loneliness, of noisy shops too shrill, 
And tawdry rooms too silent, raised her hand 
Smutched with cheap rings, and touched the 
window-sill. 

[227] 



Then with a shrug she turned and faced us all; 

Her faded eyes were cheapened of their dreams. 
"Touch it and see, you fools!" She laughed aloud. 

^Tm going home! The cold's got through my 



seams." 



Slowly we crept away. The vagabond 
Set his face whitely to the winter hosts, 

The Sapphire City faded . . . but I knew 

Its streets were thronged with weary, wistful 
ghosts. 



[228] 



THE OUTCAST 

A MAN died in the open park to-day — 
Dropped down upon the new green grass and slept 
With his face turned toward the little sailing clouds 
That went with shining wings along the sky. 

He was a laborer. He had not seen 
The clouds go ever sailing down the blue; 
But all his bitter days had cast his eyes 
At Misery's boot-heels, as she led him on. 

He lay now with that still surprise of Death 
Upon his face, as though before he died 
His startled soul had paused between his lips 
To wonder at the sails along the sky. 

His shabby hat was off. His hair seemed damp 
With some last sweat of toil, and it was gray 
And like an iron halo on his brow — 
And there was some great wonder folding him. 

[229I 



His coat lacked even patches; there was no 
Soft mark of woman's fingers on the cloth — 
His hands stretched lifeless from the raveled sleeves, 
And his poor boots were worn to nakedness. 

About him in the sunlight stood a crowd, 
A throng of idlers, staring, curious; 
And down the drives the rolling limousines 
Moved with their lithe, rich smoothness past the 
place — 

But he lay still and looked upon the sky, 
Upon the little sailing clouds that went 
Like ships of silver down their lovely seas. 
And at the sunlight, shining in their sails. . . . 

He was a laborer, and all his years 
Were reaped at Misery's boot-heels ... so he lay 
With his tremendous wonder folding him, 
And looked nis first upon the splendid sky! 



[230] 



SUBWAY TRACK-WALKERS 

Who are ye hopeless who go with dull faces, 
Treading the terrible floorways of night? 

Oft have I seen ye flick by in the shadow, 
Framed from the dark by a flutter of light. 



Do ye gaze up at the hurtling windows, 

Streaking your dusk-world with sudden bright 
lanes ? 
Do ye dream dreams of the lights and the 
faces ? 
Do ye think thoughts of the eyes at the panes? 



Far is your path through the burrows of darkness! 

Fearful the death if ye falter or blunder! 
Once I saw one of you caught in the whirlwind. 
Hurled to his fathers with steel and great 
thunder. . . . 

[231] 



What is your vision, and where is your meaning? 

Do ye walk only for Saturday's pay? 
Or are ye sent for a desperate service 

That I may ride to my true love to-day? 



[232] 



THE HAND-ORGAN MAN 

He stands in his rags at the sun-spattered curb, 

A swarthy brown fellow of tatters and smiles, 

Above his black curls are the vagabond skies, 

The light of long journeying lurks in his eyes, 

And over his shoulder are yesterday's miles. . . . 

His coat it is broken, his airs are outworn. 
Yet somehow we pause on the sidewalk to hear — 
The children come running, with May in their 

feet. 
To dance to his tunes in the clattering street, 
And Age at its window looks down with a tear. 

So out of the clamor and toil of the day 

The Organ-Man comes, with a nondescript tune, 
A smile in his eyes where the world's wisdoms 

are, 
A heart in his breast like a struggling star — 
And over his shoulder a garment of June. 

[233] 



Lord of the Summer, come up from the South! 
Come, Httle Organ-Man, come to my street, 

Play me old Aprils of sunlight and rain; 

Play me the long-ago Springtimes again! 
Play . . . till the world is once more at my feet! 



[234] 



THE MILLS HOTEL 

In from the ends of the Highway, weary and 

spent they came, 
Seared with the scars of hoping, tagged with a 

bit of name; 
There in the warmth they gathered, letting their 

garments steam, 
And never a heart in the Motley hut flaunted its 

rags o' dream! 



Out of the mouths of ditches, up from the holds 

of ships, 
With grime on their broken fingers, and life on 

their gray grim lips. 
They slouched in the dingy hallways, the queer, 

the strange, the odd. 
And never a face went by me but glozved with a 

flash of God! 

[235] 



Lost in a Book of Silence, their strangest stories lie, 

Tales of the Greater Service, that run when work- 
men die; 

And so they came from the ditches, the deep 
ships and the sea, 

And never a soul m the shelter hut carried a scar 
for me! 



[236] 



THE UNEMPLOYED 

They did not ask for lordly things, 
For temples or for lands; 

They only asked the right to use 
The glory of their hands. 

I never saw a sadder thing 
Beneath God's vaulted blue 

Than that grim line of starving men 
Who had no task to do. 

They came before the frozen stars 
Had faded from the sky, 

And all day long the wealthy folk 
Rolled curiously by. 

And all day long the waiting line 
Stood shaking in the street. 

And, oh, their willing, idle hands! 
And, oh, their aching feet! 
[237] 



I never saw a sadder thing 

In all the City's strife 
Than that worn host of ragged men 

Who waited there for Hfe. 

They did not ask for alms of gold, 
Nor things of lordly worth. 

They only asked the right to share 
The labor of the earth. 



[238] 



THE BREAD-LINE 

The word went down the moaning street, 

Through the rotting rooms where the children cry 
And the broken mothers die — 
Bread! Free Bread! 
"Go forth," they said, 
"And see if the Httle whispers He." 

The coughing men went forth to see. 
They came in herds, Hke starving goats, 
And they shook in their threadbare coats; 
"Is it true," they said, 
"That ye give us bread?" 
(And their hands clutched white at their icy 
throats.) 

"It is true," said the men by the stacked brown 
loaves. 
And they smiled with a wonderful slow, sad 
smile. 

[239] 



But the line stretched half a mile— 

"Bread, free bread, 

It is life," they said, 
'*It is life and hope for a little while." 

I said to a starved soul passing in, 

"The theory's wrong — all wrong, you know, 
A wise man found it so." 

He raised his head, 

And with blanched lips said, 
^' PFas the wise man ever hungry , Bo?" 



[240] 



FROM AN "L" TRAIN WINDOW 

I SAW bent figures toiling in a dusk 

That seemed beyond the reaches of the Day, 

Pinched faces at the grimy window squares, 
Youth turned to something wracked and old 
and gray. 

I had left sunshine on my study floor, 
Laughter behind me in a woman's eyes, 

Paintings and books and friendly smiling things, 
The sum of which is mortal paradise. 

Yet here in that same world bent figures toiled 
From gloomy windows to the deeps of gloom. 

Thin-fingered women, sad as prisoners, 
Plied glinting needles in a coffin'd room. 

The Quarter Lodgers, sprawled upon a bench. 
Read crumpled papers in the half-slain light. 

Draining the sordid romance of the press, 
Finding some little comfort from their plight. 
i6 [ 241 ] 



And then a child, with eyes to break my heart 
Leaned from a window and with hands that 
shook 

Poured water on a dead geranium — 
And that alone was worth a wise man's book. 

End o* the line, and lifting overhead, 

As in a graveyard costly shafts are wrought, 

The House of Government, white to the sun, 
And in one room a fat man, doing naught. 



[242] 



OUT OF THE NIGHT 

Out of the blur and the drift of the faces, 

Out of the night, 
She comes in the cloak of a purpling shadow, 

Into the light. 

Over her head burns the guttering street-lamp. 

Touching her face — 
The crowd surges by her with jest or with loathing, 

Grudging her place. 

Men in the garments of Priests and of Savants 

Pass with no word — 
She leans at the lamp-post, half dead and all-dying, 

The prey of the herd. 

Mother of God, can you still grant us laughter, 

Seeing her die? 
We who have murdered thy holiest vessel, 

My world and I! 

[243] 



WASHINGTON SQUARE 

'TwAS a long-ago summer when Romance and I 
Came trudging to Washington Square, 

And, oh, what a laughter illumined the walls 
Of our room at the top of the stair — 

Our poor little, odd little jest of a room 
At the top of the boarding-house stair! 

Laughter, and Youth, and a heart for the game, 
The short road to Love, and tJie long road to Fame; 
And all roads before us and all roads to dare. 
And that was the glory of Washington Square! 

Romance was twenty and I was no more, 

And there was a window, you see. 
That gave us the park and a bit of the sky. 

And sometimes a breath from the sea; 
And small, ragged children would pause in their 
play 
To laugh up at Romance and me. 

[ 244 ] 



ChildreUy and Windy and the blue sky above. 
The drear road to Fame, and the dear road to Love; 
And all roads beginning and all roads to dare. 
And that was the wonder of Washington Square! 

I think I was painting the face of a dream, 

And Romance was posing in red, 
And daylight was only the throb of my heart, 

And the tremble of sun on her head. 
And twilight was only the sound of her voice, 

And the sense of a radiance fled. 

Twilight, and Dawn, and the dream without name. 
The fair road to Love, and the far road to Fame; 
The star of her face and the light of her hair. 
And that was the vision of Washingt07i Square, 

The gold of earth's giving has lain In my purse, 

Of laurel IVe taken my share — 
But where is the laughter that hallowed our room 

At the top of the boarding-house stair? 
And where are the Children, and where is the 
Dream 
That led me to Washington Square? 

[245] 



Laughter, and Youth, and a heart for the game. 
The old road to Love, and the hold road to Fame; 
And all roads beginning and all roads to dare. 
And that was the glory of Washington Square! 



[246] 



DIALECT POEMS 



THE ROAD TO VAGABONDIA 

'E WAS sittin' on a door-step 

As I went strollin' by; 
A lonely little beggar 

With a wistful, 'omesick eye — 
An' 'e weren't the kind you'd borrow, 

An' 'e weren't the kind you'd steal, 
But I guessed 'is 'eart was breakin', 

So I w'istled 'im to 'eel. 

They 'ad stoned 'im through the city streets, and 

naught the city cared, 
But I was 'eadin' out'ard, and the roads are 

sweeter shared. 
So I took 'im for a comrade, and I w'istled 'im 

away — 
On the road to Vagabondia, that lies across the day! 

Yellow dog 'e was; but bless you — 
'E was just the chap for me! 
[249I 



For Vd ruther 'ave an inch o* dog 

Than miles o' pedigree. 
So we stole away together, 

On the road that 'as no end, 
With a new-coined day to fling away 

And all the stars to spend! 

Oh, to walk the road at mornin', when the wind 

is blowin' clean, 
An' the yellow daisies fling their gold across a 

world o' green — 
For the wind it 'eals the 'eartaches, an' the sun 

it dries the scars. 
On the road to Vagabondia that lies beneath the 

stars. 

'Twas the Wonder o' the Going 

Cast a spell about our feet — 
An' we walked because the world was young, 

Because the way was sweet; 
An' we slept in wild-rose meadows 

By the little wayside farms, 
'Til the Dawn came up the 'ighroad 

With the dead moon in 'er arms. 
[ 250 ] 



Oh, the Dawn it went before us through a shinin' 

lane o' skies, 
And the Dream was at our 'eartstrings, an' the 

Light was in our eyes, 
An' we made no boast of glory an* we made no 

boast o' birth, 
On the road to Vagabondia that lies across the 

earth! 



[251] 



THE GOLDEN WEDDING 

"There, Mother, they've gone, all our young uns, 
That's John in th' new-fangled rig, 

And Billy is drivin' his roadster, 
And Jim's got a yellow-wheeled gig. 

"Fred's bought a new car. It's a racer. 

Pray Heaven it holds t' th' track! 
And Tom's got a spindle-legged shofer 

To drive him to business an' back. 

"Well, well, times have changed a whole jugful. 

An' I ain't th' one to complain; 
Our boys are as good as their decade. 

There's none of 'em warped in th' grain, 

"But different, Mother, an' wiser. 
Not much like the old-fashioned sort. 

We're classed with oil-lamps and religion — 
They're classed with hygienics an' sport, 

[252] 



"There, there. I don't mean tu be bitter, 
Not now, on our own precious night. 

Lord, Mother, you're just Hke a picture 
A-sittin' there, framed in th' light! 

"Come, pull up your chair to th' fire. 
And put down those socks for a spell. 

Th' runs an' th' holes that you've mended 
Would swallow th' space in a well. 

"There's fifty glad years in th' ashes. 
An' plenty o' wood in th' box. 

An' this is a special occasion, 

So put down that basket o' socks. 

"There's fifty glad years in th' ashes, 
An' more in th' leapin' red flame; 

The rest o' the world has been changin'. 
But, Mother, we two are th' same. 

"You're just as you were at th' weddin', 

A girl, an* a purty one, too. 
We laid our first fire together — 

It's lasted us all the years through. 
[253] 



"The flame that we lighted that evenin' 
Is still mighty bright on th' hearth, 

An', Mother, we'll keep it a-burnin' 
As long as we travel this earth. 

**The new generation may rule us. 
There ain't no escapin', it seems. 

But Age has its port from the changing 
Its little odd harbor for dreams. 

"An' that's by th' side o' the fire. 
Where years are so easy to spend. 

The world may belong to our children. 
But we'll be ourselves to the end. 

"So give me a kiss, my heart's dearie. 
It's love glowin' red in our flame. 

Though all th' wide world has been changin'. 
My Sweetheart and I are the same!" 



[254] 



HAVANA BAY 

Now IVe been down the world, mates, 

From London to Bombay; 
Fve seen some pretty harbors, 

If you'll let me have my say — 
But never was a sweeter port 

Than blue Havana Bay! 

Blue as the eyes of Love, mates. 

As you -put in from the sea — 
With dream-dusk in the outer depthsy 

And sapphire at the quay; 
And if you must take ship, mates. 

From here to Judgment Day, 
You'll never find a sweeter port 

Than blue Havana Bay, 

'Twas half a week to Christmas 
When we rounded Sandy Hook, 
[255] 



And there was nigh a ton of ice 

In every sea we took. 
And heading down to Hatteras, 

The cook he says to me: 
"It's hard to do your dying 

In a roaring winter sea!" 

Twas winter down our decks^ mates. 

And winter in our sparsy 
And once I thought the foremast light 

Was tangled in the stars. 
But down across the sky, mates. 

And half a world away. 
The great, gold dawn was storming up 

To blue Havana Bay. 

And first the sticks went out of her, 

And then she sprung a leak; 
(The cook, he said he'd never spent 

So sad a Christmas week.) 
But then we rigged a jury-mast, 

And cut the wreck away, 
And swung our broken bowsprit 'round 

To blue Havana Bay. 



Blue as the eyes of Love^ mates, 

As you put in from the sea — 
With dream-dusk in the outer depths^ 

A7id sapphire at the quay; 
And, oh, to see the shadow 

Of old Morro lifting gray 
As you stumble down the Cuba coast 

To blue Havana Bay! 

Now Fve been down the world, mates, 

From London to Bombay, 
But never will my soul forget 

The glory of that day 
When we came down from the coast of Death, 

To blue Havana Bay. 



17 



[257I 



MAGGIE McFAY 

A BALLAD OF THE TRAFFIC SQUAD 

This is the story av Maggie McFay, 
And Dennis O'Toole av the Squad, 

A Ser-rgint av mounted police be rank 
And a man be the grace av God. 

He was sivin fut tall wid his cap and all 
And he paid for his boots be the mile, 

But gurls av his beat they forgave him his feet 
For the sake av his heart-melthin' smile. 

Yit he threated thim crool, did this Ser-rgint 
OToole, 

And the divil a bit did he care; 
Till Maggie McFay turned the corner that day, 

Wid the gold av the sun in her hair. 

Wid the light av the skies in her soft, blue eyes, 
And her hair av a golden sheen, 

[258] 



And she smiled like a witch at wan side av the ditch, 
And the thraffic, it rumbled between. 

Faith, the autymobiles made a river av wheels. 

But Dennis, he lifted his hand 
Wid a gistoor like fate makin' speeches av state, 

And he brought all the wurrld to a sthand. 

Thin, crookin' his finger at Maggie McFay, 

And swillin' his chist like a King, 
The Thraflfic Squad's pride crossed the street in wan 
stride, 

Wid Maggie tucked under his wing. 

And the fat millionaires and the Lady Eclaires, 
And the whole av the Great Embossed, 

They nivir moved wheel av wan autymobile 
Till Dennis and Maggie had crossed! 

*'And phwat is the pay for me throuble the day?" 

Says Ser-rgint O'Toole wid a grin. 
Says Maggie, " *Tis this!'' And she landed a kiss 

On the p'int av the blatherskite's chin. 

[259] 



And that is the sthory av Maggie McFay, 
But sthop! There is wan thing more — 

This Dennis av mine, he was twinty-and-nine, 
And Maggie McFay was just four! 



[260] 



LADDIE 

'E's a bit of a vagabond, same as me, 
'E's brother to beggars, and friend to a flea, 
'E's a son of the 'ighroad, the old sea-and-sky 
road. 
The road that leads out to the far and the 
free! 
They say it*s a wrong road — God knows it's a 
long road! — 
But Lor', it's a song-road to Laddie and me. 

'E's blind in one eye, and 'is tail is on crooked; 

'Is legs is too long — a misfortune o' birth. 
But 'e's gay as a man, and 'e's true as a woman, 

And twice 'e 'as followed me over the earth! 

'E's only a dog — but 'e followed me true, 
Which the flesh o* your flesh won't sometimes do. 
We 'eld to the byways, the old sea-and-sky 
ways, 

[261] 



The ways that lead out to the gold and the blue! 
God knows they were far ways! — and stranger 
than star-ways, 
But Lor', they were our ways, so what could we do ? 

Then 'urry the Spring! Sweep the snow from the 
passes! 
The roads they are callin' us far away; 
To-morrow . . . we'll sleep in the sweet o' strange 
grasses, 
Sleep long, and wake slowly, as vagabonds may. 

'E's a bit of a vagabond, same as me, 
'E's brother to beggars, and friend to a flea; 
*E's a son of the 'ighroad, the old sea-and-sky 
road, 
The road o' strange fortune that leads to the free! 
God knows it*s a long road — but if it's a song- 
road. 
It cant be the wrong road for Laddie and me! 



[262] 



THE BALLAD OF DENNIS McGINTY 

"I WILL marry none but a King," she said, 
Wid a flash av her eye, and a toss av her head; 

(And she was but barely turned twinty). 
And all av the lads who came ridin' down, 
They smothered their sighs and wint back to 
town — 

All excipt Dennis McGinty. 

"I will have me a riyal Prince to wed, 

A Prince on a milk-white steed," she said; 

(And she was then two-and-twinty). 
And all av her lovers, they looked at their 

nags. 
And fled wid their hear-rts in their saddle-bags, 

All excipt Dennis McGinty. 

"I will marry a landed lord," she cried, 
"Wid castles tall and acres wide"; 
(And she was then four-and-twinty), 

[263] 



But all av her gallants, they turned away, 
For divil a bit av a castle had they, 
All excipt Dennis McGinty. 

"I will marry the bravest who comes," she sighed, 
"The man av most courage shall have me to bride"; 

(And she was then six-and-twinty). 
And out came the weapons for miles around, 
And all the lads fought till they fell to the ground — 

All excipt Dennis McGinty. 

"At least I will marry a man," she said, 

Wid a blush to her cheek and a hang to her head; 

(And then she was eight-and-twinty). 
But there wasn't the likes av a marryin' lad 
Left alive in the land — excipt wan, bedad. 

And — she married Dennis McGinty, 



1 264] 



LITTLE FISHERMAN 

**Ho, bonny little Fisherman with the blue eye 

and the basket. . . . 
Where are ye goin' now — if I may ask it?" 

"Oh, Fm goin* down to the tinklin' brook, that 

flows beneath the willow. 
An* Fll sit in the shade of a pretty tree, with a 

green moss pillow." 

"An' what *11 ye do when ye're sittin' there, my 

little Fisher-laddie, 
Will ye catch a whoppin' spotted pike, or a siller 

shaddie?" 

"Oh, ril catch nae one nor t'other, lass, nor siller 

fish nor mottle, 
But Fll sit in the shadow of a green tree, an' 

drink fra' a brown bottle!" 

[26s] 



CHRISTMAS ON THE ROAD 

'TwAS the gray o' Christmas morning when we 

struck the open road, 
Behind us in the withered dawn the lights o* 

Christmas glowed; 
The little lights o' Christmas-tide that stand upon 

the trees, 
And warm the hearts o' vagabonds across the 

Seven Seas. 



Across the wide, wide seas, Laddie, where you and 

I have gone. 
And de'il a light is lit for us adown the Christmas 

dawn; 
But all the road^s a gift. Laddie, and all the world 

is ours. 
And there'll be Christmas candles when we lift th^ 

winter stars! 

[266] 



You* re nothing but a mongrel, with a memory for 

a tail, 
And your hide is lemon-yaller, and your pedigree 

is pale. 
But to-day you'd be plumb precious — if you 

weren't so bloomin' sad: — 
'Cause it*s Christmas, Laddie, Christmas — and 

you're all I ever had. 



It's Christmas on the road, Laddie, so kick your 

heels and go; 
The little lights o* Christendom are shining on the 

snow; 
The lights are on the trees. Laddie — Lor\ how the 

windows gleam! 
And all Vve got! s a yaller dog to keep the Christmas 

dream, . . . 



The rich they set their candles on their blinded 

window-sills. 
But all the Light o' Christendom is streaming 

from the hills, 

[267] 



And you and I shall trail it to the twilight — or 

beyond. 
So Merry Christinas^ yaller dog, you precious 

vagabond! 

The rich are none so gay. Laddie, they hear a weary 

load; 
But yaller dogs, and raggea men, they walk the open 

road. 
So turn you to the dawn. Laddie, and kick your heels 

and go — 
The fairest Day o' Christendom is shining on the 

snow! 



THE END 



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